


like the sun and stars above

by demigodbeautiies



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Royalty, Alternate Universe - Thieves, Angst, Intrigue, M/M, Minor Injuries, Minor Violence, Mutual Pining, Pining, Political Intrigue, Slow Burn, Strangers to Lovers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-22
Updated: 2021-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:20:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 26,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27147250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/demigodbeautiies/pseuds/demigodbeautiies
Summary: “My God, ” he said, pressing a hand to his chest. Nico grinned.“Just me,” he said.-Nico di Angelo was sent on a job most would deem risky, or at the very least, fucking stupid. But he's the best there is, and the Crown is no match for him. The people he finds along the way, however, might be a different story.
Relationships: Nico di Angelo/Will Solace, side ships - Relationship
Comments: 54
Kudos: 128





	1. the best damn thief money could buy

**Author's Note:**

> WELL. This was a bit I was working on while I finished up some other fics, and now that they're done my brain has decided this MUST be posted. So like, enjoy this bit of "high fantasy sun and moon gays vaguely inspired by Megan Whalen Turner"
> 
> EDIT 2/2/21: So, this has had a revamp! I haven't really changed much plot wise, but I did rework a fair bit of it (and added something like 1k words) so feel free to reread.

“I’m not exactly confrontational.”

“If you can manage without murder, great. But don’t do anything stupid.”

“Like what, commit a murder?”

“You know what I mean.”

“In and out, Reyna. It’ll be fine.”

He always was.

☽☼☾

It was a simple job, as far as Nico was concerned. He supposed that anyone with sense or respect for the law might disagree, but Nico had neither.

It was just like any other job. There was no point avoiding a little bit of risk when there was something to be won from it. 

This job had _a lot_ to be won from it. 

It had been made clear that maiming wasn’t an issue, so long as said maiming came from an unknown, unseen force. That wasn’t Nico’s style. 

He was the man who snuck into any building with something worth stealing, and he was known across the kingdom for that alone. Within the hour of starting any given job, he would be back on his way, mark none the wiser and pockets lined and ready to get paid by whoever had sent him out in the first place. 

He was a cat burglar. He worked with people who got their way with swords and bats and violence, but he snuck into their homes while they slept and pilfered his prizes with light, deft hands. His style was all about a light touch, keeping quiet and, most of all, avoiding confrontation. 

The locked window opened silently. 

Nico slipped through in the dark and dropped onto the counter running just below it, crouching on the cool marble. Bright light from the moon behind him shone past, illuminating stretches of the room as he maneuvered through and slid silently onto the floor. 

He blinked to let his eyes adjust to the shadows, until he could see the room with more clarity. It was extravagant, with luscious velvet drapery and gilded leather books along every bookcase lining the wall.

The furniture was a rich mahogany, but everything else was a startlingly bright gold. The pens on the writing desk, amid books and boxes and baubles; the trim on the velvet pillows; the frames hanging on every square inch of exposed wall. Nico could see it all glinting in the moonlight amidst the scattered mess of paper and cloth. His eyes traced the room from head to toe, until he got to the centre of it.

In the middle of the room, was a bed. It was far too big, Nico thought. Enough to house four adults and countless children on top. There were four posts, more velvet pillows, what looked like silk sheets, and - 

A man. 

He was looking directly at Nico, eyes open wide in shock and surprise. They glimmered in the light of the stars shining through the window, a bright blue that shocked Nico to the bone in a second flat. 

He had just enough sense to step backwards, towards the shadows, but it was too late, and he knew it. He’d been seen, and not by a fool young enough to believe it was just a bad dream. 

The man sat up, scrambling to light the lantern at his bedside, too quick for Nico to tell what shadows might remain for him to slink back into. He cursed as the room was flooded with warm light, casting a bright glow on his face.

“Who are you?” the man asked, voice rough with sleep and exhaustion.

Nico was the best damn thief that money could buy. 

He did not wake people up when he was planning to rob them, and he did not _tell them who he was._

He stayed silent. 

In any other case, getting caught would make him pull himself back to the windows and duck into the night - not that he had been caught enough to put that skill to use. In any other circumstance he would be gone at a moments’ notice, slinking down the side of the walls and leaving, as quick and quietly as he had arrived. 

But that wasn’t an option, not for this job. 

Maiming wasn’t his style, but neither was leaving an eyewitness. 

Least of all when the witness was a member of the royal family. 

☽☼☾

He had been confident when he took the job, almost stupidly so. Let him be the only thief good enough to sneak into the castle and rob the Crown Prince. 

He had been confident when it came time to scale the walls of the gaudy palace, with its glimmering white stones and gold ornamentation that would pay for his early retirement, and then some.

It had been built for the luxury of the Crown, and to discourage the idea of rebellion, but it hadn’t been built to keep him out. It was a castle built for grandeur, with posturing guards that were easy to avoid and the incorrect assumption that there weren’t people desperate enough to find its secrets. 

There had been a plan, believe it or not, despite how many times his accomplices deemed it _stupid._ A plan that didn’t involve murder, maiming, or anything more than he could handle. 

And he had been confident with it. He was confident relying on the skills that had yet to fail him, and the knowledge that he knew what he was doing. 

He had _not_ been expecting the Crown Prince to be awake when he arrived. 

He had researched and studied and snooped and thought, and every account he had been able to find said that the Crown Prince was early to bed and early to rise, up with the sun and down as it set.

But he was not asleep.

Nico could feel himself starting to flounder, thoughts racing as he took stock of his options. He could leave, straight out the way he came, but any Prince worth his crown would be calling guards the moment he took a step backwards. If he hurt him nonlethally after he’d let his face be seen he’d be in even deeper shit, but his alternative was -

“You’re a pretty awful assassin,” the Prince said. 

Nico startled out of his thoughts, caught off guard.

“I’m not an assassin,” he said, on instinct. 

The Prince blinked.

 _Talking_ to the mark was one step further off the plan. 

The Prince opened his mouth to reply, but was cut off by a sharp rap at the door.

It drew his attention away from Nico for just a moment, but it was just a moment that Nico needed. He stepped back with long strides, once, twice, lifting his feet silently to curl back onto the marble windowsill. The window, still unlatched, fell open silently, and Nico stepped out, not bothering to lock it as he dropped onto the ledge below soundlessly. 

Time to figure it out as he fucking went. 

He heard the door creak open in the room above his head, silently tucking himself into a crevice to make a plan. It was created by the excessive decorative ornaments on the walls, but it could only hide him for so long. Imperceptibly, he pressed himself closer to the wall. 

“Your Highness?” a voice above him said. He strained his ears to listen closer, struggling to hear over the hard thumping in his chest. “We have the tea you sent for.”

“Thank you so much,” the Prince replied. Nico rolled his eyes. It was just his luck he’d been sent to rob the one Prince with sleeping problems. 

“Did you need anything else, Your Highness?”

Nico took a breath. 

Without thought, his hand had strayed to the small knife strapped to his leg, and he forced it to stop. He wasn’t going to resort to anything _rash._

The Prince had seen him leave through the window. He had to know where he had gone. In half a second he could have guards swarming the courtyard, eyes looking in every corner before Nico could even get off of the wall. He’d be trapped.

He wasn’t in the business of murder, and he damn well wanted it to stay that way. 

“Everything’s fine,” the Prince said.

Nico blinked. 

Did they already know? Was he using hand signals to point his way? Had he just misheard?

The alternative was unthinkably stupid. Hearing the Crown Prince fail to point a finger in the direction of a potential assassin didn’t fill him with high hopes for the monarchy. 

He wasn’t about to press his luck. 

He shifted, preparing to be stuck perching for a long while. 

☽☼☾

No guards had swarmed.

The night got deeper and darker, but there had been no lantern light from guards aside from the rhythmic light guiding the sentries as they looped through the grounds. Nico had watched, counting, checking they hadn’t changed from the patterns he had first clocked weeks ago when he had started planning.

By the early morning, still deep and dark, but distinguished by the chimes of distant church bells, Nico gave up on hiding.

With a final, baffled glance up towards the window he had come from, he skirted the ledge bordering the castle and slipped, silently, into the night.

It wasn’t far to retrace his steps back the way he came to enter the castle, but he didn’t have the luxury of taking a direct route. Not many people came and went from the castle in the middle of the night, let alone in dark black clothes and leather boots made for sneaking, _let alone_ after speaking face to face with the Crown Prince. 

He hadn’t been chased, or beaten, or caught, but he forced himself to slink through the shadows until he was far enough away to avoid suspicion nonetheless. 

The sun was rising when he returned, bright rays cutting through trees overhead as he walked, stepping close to the heavy trunks to stay away from prying eyes. 

If he didn’t have to worry about the trail he left, he could be to and from the castle in under an hour. But he always did have a trail to consider. If he brought any sense of trouble to the home of his employer - 

It was a large estate, and an isolated building, for the most part. Just the way he liked it, even if it wasn’t home. 

To Nico, it was a place to stay. The home of the Lord who paid him and fed him, and nothing more.

It wasn’t home. 

He slipped around to the back of the house, through the doors into the kitchen. It wasn’t busy, not this early, but Nico slid along the wall quickly to a thin door that led up the servant’s stairs before any of the cooks could see him. He tucked himself close to the side of the steps as he climbed, more out of habit than necessity, to make as little noise as he could as he ascended.

He pushed open a door to his left, into one of the many quiet, disused rooms hidden among the sprawling estate. 

“Breakfast?” he said, and the two figures at the table jolted, cut out of their quiet contemplation by his surprise appearance. 

He grinned, rolling an assortment of bread and fruit onto the surface, pinched quickly and quietly from the kitchen on his arrival. 

“You’re too fucking quiet,” Jason muttered, turning back over his shoulder from where he had looked up, and reached for a roll. 

“Where’s the ring?” Reyna asked, without further preamble. 

Nico rolled his eyes.

“Good morning to you too, Reyna, light of my life-”

“This isn’t the time to fuck around,” she reminded him. Her arms were crossed, and it made her look more severe than she already acted.

“I don’t have it,” he said.

“Nico,” Jason said, voice low with a note of warning in it. 

They were all under the employment of the Lord, as staff of the house. 

They worked to ensure his assets remained protected. If pressed by the courts, they were security guards. If left to their own devices, they were the trio on the ground that let the lord keep his money, and made him more. 

It was a lucrative role they all played, and Reyna wasn’t wrong. There wasn’t the time to be playing games, not with their employer. There was a lot riding on this ring, and the man who had asked for it wasn’t one to be trifled with. Adding in the fact that the Prince had seen him standing, face lit by candlelight - 

“I’m going back for it,” Nico said. Jason let out a low breath through clenched teeth. 

“Your Uncle would have your head if he thought-”

“I know,” Nico snapped, a sour flicker of something curling in his gut at the reminder of who it was that had sent him out.

His uncle. 

The Lord Levesque. The man who had told him to get the ring, and who he would have to answer to if he failed. 

If asked, Nico was staff for the family that owned the estate. 

It was a quiet fact, known by very few, that Nico was related by blood to the Lord of the house. He didn’t share his name, and it was names that mattered, but Reyna and Jason were among the few that knew there was any relation at all. 

At the end of the day, he wasn’t family, not where it counted. Very few people that had been trusted to do less than legal pieces of work for them were. 

And God forbid someone though he was employed for his name, over the fact he was the best damn thief in the kingdom. 

The facts were, he was better than any other option, and his name meant nothing. Forget the fact it was a far from insignificant sum of power Levesque held, over his staff, the homes on his land, the sway of the kingdom. It was a system Nico worked to uphold, and he didn’t factor into it in any other way.

“You’re cutting it fucking close, di Angelo,” Jason said. 

“It was too risky.”

“Too risky for _you?_ You don’t have a bone of self preservation in your entire body.”

“But no one saw you?” Reyna cut in, fierce gaze drawing Nico’s eyes back to her. 

He looked her in the eye, and thought back to blue eyes lit bright, even in the dark of the night. 

Reyna was senior to him, stronger and faster and altogether someone with more power. She was as close to a right hand to the Lord as any of them could hope to be.

“Not a soul.”

☽☼☾

He was, like most thieves, stubborn. 

It was only a few nights after his first attempt that Nico found himself tucked behind the same gaudy ornamentation that served as his cover nights before. 

Jason hadn’t been wrong when he had said that Nico was cutting it close, even if there was time to spare. He had given Reyna a day that he would be able to present the ring, and the weeks were counting down. 

The Lord wasn’t a man to be trifled with, but Nico could do his damn job, if only people would let him. 

He stood, pulling himself up onto a higher ledge and ducking into a crouch outside the Prince’s window. Cautiously, he peered into the room. He was outside the Prince’s parlour, a few windows over from the one Nico had crawled through the night before. 

This room was lit by candlelight, a few forgotten tapers left atop tables, and had much the same decor. Paintings adorning each wall, bookshelves, with a circle of chairs and lounges in the centre, and just as much mess.

And as far as he could tell, it was empty.

He clicked open the lock with silent hands and slipped into the room. 

He stepped down onto the floor, leather boots letting him move silently as he found his footing and slunk along the wall, obscured by velvet curtains hanging just far enough from the wall that they wouldn’t move as he walked. 

He stopped when he reached the end of the room, stepping out of the relative safety of the fabric to tuck himself between the wall and the bookcase. He could wait until he knew it was clear to move, and then - 

“Can I help you?”

Nico froze. 

His eyes shot up to the source of the noise and fell still. 

He was not, in fact, in an empty room.

Nico stayed silent, mouth shut tight as he looked into blue eyes that reflected like sharp glass. 

The Prince stood in the doorway into his bedchamber, looking at Nico. How on God’s green earth had he not seen him? 

But more importantly, how had he seen Nico? 

“How small are you that you can fit behind my bookcase?” the Prince said again, and Nico fought not to swear. 

It had to have been a fluke the first time the Prince had seen him. A spell of bad luck, a man up past his bedtime. But here he was, _again_ . His eyes had found Nico’s in the shadows, in a way that no other mark ever had. _Again_. 

It was baffling. 

It was baffling, but the longer he delayed, the larger the risk was that the Prince would pull himself together and do something disastrous. 

Slowly, cautiously, fingers grazing just once over the knife strapped to his leg to remind himself he had it, Nico moved out of the shadows. 

He could get a better look at the Prince, this time, even in the dim, fading, candlelight. He was blond, curly golden hair sitting in a messy mop atop his head, but he had seen that the previous night. Nico could also tell, better than he had been when he was lying down in the dark, that the Prince was tall, with broad shoulders and infinitely more confidence than Nico could dream of. 

“Would you like to take a seat?” the Prince said, after a moment, and Nico blinked. 

The Prince moved on without a care in the world, walking towards the plush chairs in the centre of the room and dropping down onto them. 

“I’ll stand,” Nico said, after an uncomfortably long stretch of silence. 

“No one usually gets away with telling royalty _no,_ ” the Prince replied, a grin on his face that Nico found instantly infuriating. He tilted his head back to look at Nico with lidded eyes. “It’s refreshing.”

Nico stayed silent. 

The way the Prince lay back left his throat on full display, a rich expanse of golden skin dotted with freckles and marks. He could think of four ways he could dispatch him right now, in silence, and still have time to leave before anyone was any wiser.

The Prince was a fool. 

“You haven’t told me your name,” the Prince continued, as if Nico would converse with him like he was a courtier. 

“Very observant,” Nico said, and the Prince laughed, bright and bubbly.

“What is your name?” he tried, sitting forward.

“You’ve never told me yours.”

“I assumed you would know.”

“How presumptuous.”

The Prince stood again, looking once, pointedly, at the seat he had just offered to Nico. He stepped back around the chairs to a table Nico had seen and ignored, and picked up a silver teapot. He could see flashes of metal, delicate tea cups and silver teaspoons, as the Prince moved wordlessly.

“Would you like tea?” he asked, and Nico fought not to roll his eyes. He wasn’t here for a tea party. 

“No,” he said, and the Prince grinned, looking up at him with a look that might have been delight.

“My name is William,” he said. “But I’d demand you call me Will if I thought I could control you whatsoever.”

“A pleasure to meet you,” Nico said, snark rolling off him in waves. 

Nico watched his broad hands as they moved. The Prince’s jewellery glimmered in the light of the lanterns as he made his tea.

“Why is it you’re here?” he asked, looking back up at Nico, and then around the room. “I don’t remember setting up any meetings in my bedroom _or_ parlour.”

“You know that spies aren’t meant to tell you, right?” 

The Prince shrugged.

“I imagine spies are also not meant to stay chatting while a Prince stalls waiting for a guard.”

Nico froze. 

Maybe Reyna was right, and he was getting reckless. Maybe he was just a fool, lulled into a sense of complacency by his own stupid pride. 

Or maybe the Prince was smarter than he had expected. 

All he wanted at that moment was for the Prince to be quiet, to stop moving his teacups so Nico could _listen,_ because there was suddenly a very real chance that he had made a horrible mistake. 

The Prince set his teacup down delicately, near soundlessly, and Nico was floundering. Not panicking, never panicking, but struggling, forcing thoughts and plans and routes to shoot through his head as fast as he could think them clearly. 

He was well trained, an expert at what he did, but here he was, still standing making small talk with a man he had severely underestimated. 

The Prince stepped closer. 

If he turned to run, his back would be to the Prince. He should have never been in a situation where his mark had eyes on him while he was blind, but it was too late for that now. 

He was a scant foot away from Nico now, hands laced delicately behind his back in a posture of men cocky with power that they knew they could wield. 

“I can have you hanged,” he said, voice quiet. His head was tilted back, looking down his nose at Nico. He was already taller than him, and had no need to flaunt his power more than he already was. 

Nico’s eyes narrowed. 

It was like he moved like he knew what should make him look powerful. As if he did it by necessity, and not because he was confident he held all the cards. 

Like he knew he was out of his depth. 

Nico called his bluff. 

“You could,” Nico said slowly, “But you didn’t the first time.”

“You’re right,” the Prince replied, “But you still risked it.”

“I had something to see to.”

“To see to, or to steal?”

“I’m sure you’d love to know.”

“You don’t have what you were looking for,” the Prince said, grinning down at Nico. He was right, of course, but this might be the best and only chance Nico had. If he would just move his hands - 

A knock sounded at the door. 

“Fuck,” Nico said, stepping back, but the Prince followed, moving closer step by sudden step until they were stood toe to toe. 

Nico felt a wall press up against him, the Prince hovering over him, but before he could move to grab for his knife, something pressed into his palm, sharp creases digging into his skin. And then he was moving on instinct, like he so often did, before he could think to drop it.

“Next time,” the Prince whispered, and then he was spinning on his heel and striding towards the door. 

Nico bolted, darting across the room into the shadowy corner he had first gone to and searching frantically for a notch that should be beneath one of the many gilded gold frames.

He had learnt everything he could about the castle, because knowledge was power in the dark corners of the kingdom that he came from. 

The wall popped forward, exposing a doorway into a dark tunnel, and without a sound, Nico slipped through and disappeared.

☽☼☾

It wasn’t safe enough to stop until he was curled up in a protective ball atop the thin mattress he called his, back in the Levesque estate. 

It was barely even safe to do it then, but it was as safe as he could hope to get. He had clutched his hand tightly the entire way back to the estate, moving as fast as he could with his heart fluttering against his ribs. 

Tucked into the corner of the tiny closet of a space he called a bedroom, Nico unfurled his fingers to reveal his prize, pressed into his skin with warm hands by a man that should have killed him, and had failed to do so, twice.

It was paper.

It looked like it had once been folded with crisp, neat corners, but it had since been crumpled by the tightness of Nico’s grip, ink smudging just slightly. He unfolded it carefully, neatening the creases with deft hands. 

Written in the centre, in a messy scrawl of red ink, was a message. 

_A deal for what you came for. Come again at midnight._

He blinked down at the words. 

The best thief money could buy shouldn’t be enticed into a viper’s nest by a man that could raise his hand and have him killed. But it had been twice now that the Prince had avoided doing exactly that, and Nico was only human. 

He was curious _._

More than that, he was enraptured by the idea of a _deal,_ let alone a deal with a Prince. What on earth could Nico have to offer a man who stood to inherit a kingdom? 

More importantly, what could the Prince offer him?

If the Prince was lying, he was being drawn willingly into his own death. But if he wasn’t lying - 

If the Prince made a deal and gave up his ring, Nico could get what he had been sent for, and the hefty pay that came with it. 

But he stood to gain more. 

This was his chance at holding something over the Prince, to finally get a taste of what it was like to have real power. 

He had underestimated the Prince once already. There was a chance that he knew more than Nico had given him credit for. He could walk away rich with gold, but more so, with _power_. With information, and that was its own currency that could buy far more than anything glimmering. 

It was a siren call, but Nico was curious. Why had the Prince let him go free, not once, but twice? What if he had been an assassin? What if he had been robbing him blind? 

He had no idea how the Prince worked, or what went on inside his head, but it felt like a puzzle that he had to solve. The money, power, information - it was all a damn good reason to go back and make a deal. 

But Nico wanted to solve the Prince. 

And besides; no matter what it was the Prince had planned, Nico could get himself out of trouble just as easily as he got himself into it. 

This seemed like a risk worth taking. 

☽☼☾

He slept on and off through the day, like he so often did, until the sun began to set, and his countdown began. 

Jason and Reyna had thrown taunts his way for as long as they’d known him, on his penchant for risk and his stupidity when it came to stubbornly seeking out a prize. 

But he was still alive, wasn’t he? That had to count for something. 

He had only so long before the Prince was set to be expecting him - and wasn’t that a strange thought? - as he ducked through the hallowed halls of the Levesque estate, pausing at each corner out of habit.

He stopped at the kitchen. 

They were hardly in charge of a royal feast, but the cooks worked hard. He wordlessly slipped an armful of bread rolls into his pockets, darting around in his silent boots as he gathered a selection. 

“Those are for the staff.”

He stopped, hand outstretched, turning over his shoulder to the figure in the doorway. 

“Good evening, Hazel,” he said, tossing her a bread roll. She smiled, catching it reflexively with a roll of her eyes. 

She was dressed down, as she so often was when there was no one to perform for. She had already tied her hair up in a silk scarf, ready for bed, and she didn’t look out of place in the midst of a dark, quiet kitchen. 

“My lady,” a soft voice said, and Nico stepped back automatically, until his back pressed against the stone wall. He could see Hazel turn and smile at the girl who walked through the door behind her, caught unaware by the Lady of the house and her late night visit to the kitchen. 

He watched a moment longer, as Hazel smiled and assured her nothing was wrong, that she had come down only for tea and hadn’t wanted to bother anyone with such a small request. 

She was kind. Far too kind to be the Lady and heir to the second largest noble family in the kingdom, and he didn’t say that as an insult. She was careful, loving, fond of even the newest staff member. 

Nico had no doubt that she would be facing further trials before long, and dreaded to think of the day they came for his cousin. 

Quietly, leaving her to a moment of soft peace, Nico stepped out into the night.

☽☼☾

He was starting to think that breaking into the King’s Castle was a trifle, and other thieves were fools for not capitalising on it. 

Or, perhaps, Nico was just that good. 

He’d go with the latter. 

The third time he slipped into the Prince’s suite, it was empty, but he had stopped taking that at first glance. 

Still, he tried not to let panic seize him. If this _was_ a trap, and he had walked into it with wide eyed naivety, panic would do him no good. 

He stepped around the perimeter of the room softly, sticking to the shadows as he checked the room. He was alone, this time. 

Satisfied he wasn’t above to be jumped by the entirety of the King’s guard, he slipped back to the marble window sill, and perched on it to wait. 

It wasn’t long until the door opened and shut, and candlelight spilled into the room. Nico stayed silent on the windowsill, watching as the Prince stumbled into his parlour. 

He could wait for him to notice he had company. 

It took far longer than Nico was expecting, considering the speed with which the Prince had seen him every other time he’d been in his room. He watched in silence as the Prince stood by his door, eyes closed and head tipped forward, looking like he had been carrying around pockets weighted with rocks for the whole of the day.

But eventually, he looked up, and nearly jumped out of his skin. 

“My _God,_ ” he said, pressing a hand to his chest. Nico grinned. 

“Just me,” he said. The Prince glared. 

“At least you’re punctual,” he muttered, finally stepping away from his door and moving towards the silver tea set.

“Where were you?” Nico asked. 

“You speak very freely,” he replied, raising an eye just briefly to look at him. 

“I am your guest.”

The Prince hummed, fiddling with the silver cutlery on the tray. 

“Tea?” he asked instead, and Nico shook his head. 

He waited while the Prince fussed with the dishes and leaves, sitting patiently on the cold marble and fighting to keep his focus. Now was not the time to get distracted, but he struggled as he watched the intricate details of his large hands, tanned and strong, at work. 

“What is it you’re here for?” the Prince said, finally. He stepped away from his table, cup of tea gingerly in hand. 

“I don’t usually tell my marks what I plan on stealing,” Nico said. The Prince rolled his eyes. 

“I can’t give you what you want if you don’t share.”

Nico stared, watching the Prince intently. Judging what on earth could have compelled him to strike a deal with a thief. 

The Prince simply watched back. 

“A ring,” he said, finally. 

“Any in particular?”

“ _Your_ ring.”

The Prince blinked, looking down at his hands. Nico followed his gaze. He only had two rings on his hands, but there was only one Nico was after. 

It was the one the Prince wore every day, embossed with the golden seal of the royal family, and the Prince’s initials. Like all members of the royal family, that ring signified his power over the land. It could do immense things, and was worth a great deal, even more than the already hefty amount you would get melting it down. 

“You want my ring,” he said. Nico nodded. “The ring that can sign legal documents in my hand?”

Nico shrugged. He didn’t usually ask why he was sent to steal the things he was, and so long as he got paid, he didn’t press it. He had been curious, but not enough to risk the anger of the Lord. 

“You must think I’m stupid,” the Prince said. 

“It’s a job,” Nico replied. “You aren’t special.”

The Prince blinked, looking at him with shock thrown across his face like paint, before bursting into a fit of giggling laughter. 

“You’re a very daring man,” he said with a grin. “Fine. I’ll give you my ring, but you must do something for me.”

Nico blinked. He hadn’t expected the Prince to _agree._

Perhaps he was a fool after all.

“What do you want?”

“I want you to answer questions for me.”

“If you think I’ll sell the secrets of-”

“I’m not stupid enough to think you’d do that,” he said, waving his hand. “I want to know about the lives of my people, who I will one day rule. I want an honest, unabridged version of the world.” 

“And you couldn’t ask someone else?” 

“I could, and have you arrested instead, if you’d prefer?” 

Nico huffed. “Fine. What do you want to know?”

“No,” the Prince said. Nico blinked. “This becomes a longstanding deal. You return to the castle and answer my questions, and when I’m satisfied, I give you the ring.”

“That’s an absurd risk for me to take.”

“So is making a deal with a thief,” he said, voice level. “ So is _giving you my ring._ But these are my terms.”

Nico bit his lip. 

He liked the way the Prince pushed back.

He would have been disowned, or worse, for admitting that in some of the circles he ran with, but here, standing in the middle of the Crown Prince’s personal fucking chamber, he let himself have it. 

The people he worked with could talk back when they managed to stand where he stood now. 

“Fine,” he said. “I’ll answer your questions-”

“Honestly?” 

“I’ll make an effort,” he said, rolling his eyes. “I’ll answer your questions, and then you’ll give me the ring.”

“Alright,” he said, walking over to reach his hand out to Nico. “A deal.”

“A deal,” he replied, grasping the Prince’s hand in his and shaking it once.

The Prince was a damn fool, bartering his seal ring with a thief, but Nico thrived working with fools. 

Besides. He was starting to think he just might be a fool as well.


	2. a lonely profession

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh man i'm trying to actually keep to a regular update schedule!! Hopefully it'll be a chapter each week, but we'll see...
> 
> Anyway hope you enjoy!

Nico enjoyed having the castle as a frame of reference when he robbed someone. 

There was something about being able to compare the relative difficulty of breaking into the home of a junior advisor to the ease with which he could break into the bedroom of the crown prince.

The castle wasn’t easy to break into, by any stretch of imaginations, but at least there were fewer fucking pigeons. 

He grit his teeth to stop swearing as he nudged  _ another  _ fucking bird away from the window, lockpicks in hand. 

It had been two weeks since he finally agreed to a deal with the Prince. Life had carried on, even with the knowledge of what the inner parlour of the man in line to inherit the crown looked like, at a time when the city was meant to be asleep. 

Nico said a silent thanks as the window lock popped open, drawing his focus determinedly away from the Prince and his bedroom. He shuffled one particularly daring bird away with his knee, before sliding the window open and slipping through onto the floor. 

There were a few days before he was set to see the Prince for their first  _ meeting _ . He still couldn’t believe that he had agreed to his terms, but desire was a funny thing. 

They had formulated a plan; a time to meet, arranged on that very first night, and it was coming up fast.

They would meet after dark in his chambers, at the stroke of midnight - the Prince, it appeared, was dramatic. They would meet when he wasn’t in one of his many social arrangements and Nico wasn’t robbing city officials blind, because it was surprisingly difficult to find a time that suited them both. 

But, after however long spent debating and disagreeing, they managed to settle on a date. 

Tomorrow.

It couldn’t come soon enough. 

The idea that it might be a trap flit through his mind constantly, but he was almost, dare he say it -

Excited. 

Nico let his eyes adjust to the dark room he stood in now, with the faint glow from the street lamps having diminished even further now that he had four walls around him. It was a quiet part of the city, where the houses had long gardens that kept them away from the light of the roads, unlike every other place Nico frequented. They gave him more shadows to creep through, and he wasn’t going to complain about it.

He stepped lightly through the room towards the desk, ready to start testing drawers and drawing out papers with quick, deft hands. 

The countdown in his head had begun. 

He had time, but he never spent longer than he had to in a building he was robbing. At least, he hadn’t until he had met - 

He shook his head. 

It was  _ not  _ the time to be thinking about him. 

He let his eyes trace patterns through the dark room, blinking against the shadows, gently resting his fingers on things that might give way to something glimmering.

He had to focus.

He wouldn’t admit to anyone else that, perhaps, he enjoyed the way the Prince pushed him.

He hardly admitted it to himself, but when he thought about it - there was a spark, under his skin. It made him want to see how far he would move, what all he would concede. 

The Prince was infuriating, that much was true, but Nico didn’t have to go back. He could change his name and leave the kingdom, but he didn’t. 

He didn’t think he could, at this point. 

His eyes focused on the papers his hands had instinctively drawn out from the top most drawer. It wasn’t that he had been careless, it was that he moved on his own, now, knowing exactly what it was he needed, and where exactly to find it. 

Expense forms, land registers, inventories - 

He paused, eyes catching on a seal at the top of one crisp page. Not a seal of the crown, but one he recognised more closely. 

The Levesque family seal. 

It was from a census, it seemed. A catalogue of sorts, of the staff on retinue at the Levesque estate. 

He wasn’t on it, and that wasn’t surprising. He couldn’t see Jason or Reyna either, let alone the other staff tasked with work even less legal than theirs. 

His eyes did catch, however, on Hazel’s. His fingers traced over the letters of her name, inked neat at the top of the register, printed next to her title.

He would have had a title, had his mother lived. 

His name would have been printed where Hazel’s was, if his mother had lived. She was always the favoured one, set to inherit the money and the land and the home and the wealth. But when she passed away she took the power of the di Angelos with her. Nothing passed to Nico, and now his name wasn’t even on the list.

The Lord kept him under his retinue, silent, and hidden, but Nico was always acutely aware that it was because of his skills, and not any misplaced sense of familial obligation. 

He was left as the nephew to the Lord Levesque that became forgotten. He was a rumour, and nothing more. 

Just how he liked it. 

He pulled the census paper out from the stack, rolling it up into a tight cylinder and sliding it into his sleeve. There would be more papers relevant to him, and he intended to take them too, but there was no use putting off taking what he already knew he wanted. 

He didn’t spend much longer in that office. He slipped out the way he came within a quarter of an hour, papers rolled up tight and tucked into his coat, plus a few other coins and bits that had caught his eye.

By the time he had returned to the estate the coins had been spent on dinner and sweets, with new hauls taking their place in his pockets. It was small things: more coins, a few cigar cases, a watch, a ring. Things lifted from the pockets of people that turned their noses up at anyone looking like they might be guilty of the crime known as being poor. 

He left the remainder of his post dinner desserts on the kitchen counter, knowing the younger kids would be along to take them before long, and moved towards the stairwell to head up to his own room. 

Then Jason was in his way and Nico stepped back, startled, and not letting it show. 

“Hey,” Jason said, stepping to the side so Nico could move to the stairs. “Didn’t know you were out.”

“Work,” Nico said, and Jason nodded. As was expected.

“We’re going to town tomorrow night,” Jason said. “Meeting some of the girls, if you-”

“Want to find a girl?” Nico said, raising his eyebrow. Jason snorted. 

“You know they’re more likely to be the ones looking for girls,” Jason said. Nico smiled. “Anyway, you in?”

“Errands to run,” he said. Jason nodded. It was a lousy excuse, and not one he needed to use, but they were in the same line of work, and they both understood.

“And you know you have to-” Jason started, trailing off with a notable glance around the room. 

“If you all would just trust that I know what I’m doing, that would be great,” Nico said. Jason shrugged.

“Don’t want you standing in the way of a haul like that,” he said. Nico snorted.

“Believe me,” he said. “No one wants that.” 

☽☼☾

The night passed into day, and back into night just as fast. It was almost startling how soon Nico found himself making his way back into the castle, through dark grounds and up onto tight corners on the castle walls, standing in the same place he had once hidden to make his escape.

It was foreign to go into a room knowing someone expected him, but he had stopped thinking much of anything odd where the Prince was concerned.

Nico let himself in through the window into the empty room, curling his feet into himself to sit on the marble windowsill. He could see a clock on the bookshelf across the room, just a few minutes before midnight came. 

The Prince wasn’t late. 

After a moment he entered the room, stepping from his bedroom into the parlour with a cursory glance towards the spot Nico hid in.

Nico blinked, but the Prince didn’t say anything. 

He watched as the Prince walked to his tea set and started to make something, before he finally sat, and caught Nico’s eye. 

“Please come sit,” he said, nodding at the chair across from him. 

“I’m fine here,” Nico said. 

“Suit yourself,” he said with a shrug. “But don’t say I didn’t offer.”

“You don’t even know my name.”

“So tell me your name,” he said, smiling. 

Nico bit the inside of his cheek, hesitation clear on his face. The Prince rolled his eyes.

“We had a deal,” he reminded him.

Nico knew they had a deal, a stupid fucking deal, but it was one he had agreed to nonetheless.

God, Reyna would kill him if she ever - 

“Nico,” he said, finally. “My name is Nico.”

“Pleasure to make your acquaintance, Nico,” the Prince said. 

He said his name softly, more delicately than anyone else ever had. With a gentle  _ C,  _ that made his name sound like something precious.

“And yours.”

“What is it you do, Nico?”

“Take things,” he said, “In case you hadn’t noticed the cat burglary.”

“But now you’re here for what, information?”

“Full time thief, then,” he said. “Part time spy.”

The Prince smiled, just a small upturn of his lip. 

“Ever steal anything good?”

“Is this an interrogation?”

“I thought I was asking the questions.”

“Are you?”

The Prince grinned, a bright, boyish smile that made Nico’s cheeks feel warm.

“Do you plan on making all your answers this much of an ordeal?” he asked. Nico shrugged.

“You never stipulated I didn’t have to,” he said. 

“Well, then, I guess we’ll be seeing each other quite frequently. If you still do want the ring, that is.”

Nico sighed. He was right, and it was infuriating. 

The longer he stalled giving the Prince answers, the longer the Prince stalled in giving him the ring. 

“So,” the Prince said again, a smile on his face, like he knew he had won. “Have you ever stolen anything good?”

“Everything I steal is good,” Nico replied. “I don’t waste time with shitty hauls.”

“So you thought you’d try the castle?”

“I’m the only one good enough to get in.”

“How  _ did  _ you get in, by the way?” he asked, and Nico faltered. 

“A dangerous question for me to answer,” he said, and the Prince nodded. 

“That’s fair enough. But I wouldn’t report your entrance, if it stops our deal. It doesn’t look good for me either.”

Nico hummed. He wasn’t wrong. But getting into trouble as the Crown Prince was never going to be the same as getting in trouble as a thief acting against the Crown. It was hardly the same. 

“You’ve seen me come in through the windows,” he finally said, thinking back absently to the tunnels, and keeping his mouth shut. “I can climb.” 

“I can’t imagine how you would ever manage that,” the Prince muttered. “But I don’t doubt it. Not with you-”

“Was this really why you wanted me to come to you?” Nico asked. The Prince stopped, looking up at him. 

“I wanted to know more about my citizens,” he said. Nico nodded. 

“Only when they might sneak in to rob you, though?” he asked. The Prince grinned, eyes lighting up in something like delight, but in a moment, it turned wistful. 

He stood, moving over to the window, until he was standing just next to Nico. 

“My siblings and I are… watched,” the Prince started, Nico could see the effort he took to choose his words carefully. “Them less so, because they’re younger, but all three of us.”

He had become restless, hands fidgeting and eyes constantly roaming the grounds. Nico had watched him meander over towards him, and he watched him now, standing still. 

He looked over his own shoulder to see what the Prince was gazing out at. 

There were stars out, tonight. 

He could admit they were beautiful, but he had seen his fair share scaling the walls of the castle. 

“We can’t leave,” the Prince continued. “We can’t speak to much of anyone. Everything we know about the world is pre-approved by our father. 

Nico watched him. He couldn’t think of anyone else in the world he had less in common with, than the man at his side. 

But he understood the aching desire for freedom, for something different. For something more.

“You aren’t missing much,” was what he said, instead, and the Prince grinned, looking at Nico with a smile. 

“Perhaps not. But I’d still like to know about it,” he said, pushing himself back up with a cheeriness Nico could see right through. 

“You aren’t missing much,” he said, again. “Not unless you like too expensive bread and shitty guards.”

“How expensive is too expensive?” the Prince asked, and Nico had the startling realisation that he just didn’t know. 

“5 silver pieces for a loaf,” he said, knowing that the Prince had no frame of reference for whether that was as absurd as it was. 

But the Prince was smart, surprisingly so, and he caught on, looking sad.

“How much are people usually paid?” he asked quietly. Nico thought about it. He fidgeted with the strap on the knife still tied to his thigh.

“10 silver each day,” he said, finally. “Depending on the job. Some more, some less.”

The Prince was quiet, but Nico could see him thinking, calculating what he knew of conversion rates, and before long, he leant forward to grab a sheet of paper from the table, and a pen. He scrawled something down in his messy handwriting, and turned back.

“What jobs pay less?” he asked. 

They talked like that for a while; the Prince asking and pressing on questions Nico would have deemed banal, and Nico answering, dutifully, finding with surprise that he had no reason to lie. 

He moved to stretch after explaining to the Prince the intricacies of a pub tax, and shifted towards the window, blinking in surprise when he did.

The sun was far too close to rising.

“It’s almost sunrise,” Nico said, surprised. “I have to go before it gets light.”

“Oh,” the Prince said. “Can I just-”

“I am  _ exhausted,”  _ Nico said, again, and the Prince smiled. “Is it a crime to leave, now?”

“You don’t need to be rude,” the Prince said, arms crossed. Petulant, like a child, and Nico laughed.

“Oh, so sorry, your  _ highness, _ ” he said, rolling his eyes as he did. The Prince laughed, but soon fell quiet. 

Nico watched him, sitting quiet, unmoving.

“Please call me Will,” he said, after a long pause. “No one ever calls me Will. All my advisors-”

“Seem like stuffy old assholes,” Nico said. The Prince - 

Will. 

Will looked up at him, and smiled, and Nico found himself smiling back, unable to control it.

☽☼☾

The Levesque estate was dark when Nico returned, except for one gentle glowing window at the top of the house. Nico sighed. 

That would be Hazel.

The house was silent as he slipped in through the back, keeping quiet out of habit, and nothing else. 

He slunk up the stairs far from the front of the home, through corners and corridors used by serving staff and mercenaries, no one else. He was sure Hazel knew these back routes existed, the darker stairwells without the soft flourishes, but he never saw her move through them, even where he had to stop at times to allow the kitchen girls through. 

Before long the furnishings gave way to softer decor, with lush tapestries and gleaming hardwood floors, and Nico walked slower. Hazel’s suite was lavish, as close to the roof of the house as she could get before the rooms turned into the dorms of the servants and she was told to pick something better suited to her title. 

He paused outside her door and, offering more courtesy than he would to anyone else, knocked. 

He waited for only a moment before deciding that, as expected, knocking was a fruitless endeavour. Nico nudged the door open delicately, not even needing to jimmy the lock. 

There was a light at the end of the room that illuminated a figure hunched over the desk. Thin lace curtains offered a slight bit of privacy from the outside world, but even this close to dawn, the thicker embroidered curtains had yet to be pulled. 

She would be reading, no doubt; either studying up on something or another, or just trying to get a touch of distraction in her life. 

He tried to make noise as he moved through her room, not eager to startle her, but she showed no sense of noticing. It was a foreign concept to be loud on purpose, when he spent so much time trying to be quiet. 

“Hazel,” he said, and then he was darting back a step as she spun in her seat, pen outstretched. 

“Oh my god,” she muttered, slumping forward.

“Sorry,” he said, grinning. She rubbed her eyes, looking like she was fighting down a yawn. 

“Did you just get in?” she asked. “How late is it?”

“Very,” he said, stepping around her chair to hoist himself up on the side of her desk. He leant down to peer at what sat before her. Some book about the history of the ruling family. Studying, then. 

“Where were you?” she asked, shifting to shut her book and move around the contents of her desk. Nico could see her glance nervously at the small desk clock at the corner of her desk, with eyes red from reading in the dark for so long.

“I was working,” he said. She had stood to start tidying her living space, but she turned and levelled an appraising look at him, mouth pinched in obvious displeasure. 

“Being careful?” she said. 

“When am I not?”

“Let me think,” she said, a grin breaking out over her face. “Never?”

“I am your  _ cousin _ ,” he said, trying to sound wounded, but Hazel only smiled, a soft, tired thing.

He could see the weight dragging off of her as she moved around the room, pushing books back onto shelves and organising little trinkets. Most of them were pinched from jobs Nico went on, although Hazel never asked where he got them. 

“I can let you get ready for-” he said, but he was interrupted by a knock at the door. 

He looked forward, raising an eyebrow at Hazel. She blinked, eyes wide, as she looked back at him. 

“Company?” he asked, sliding off the desk and moving towards the door. “At this hour?”

“Nico,” she said, darting around her bed to walk after him. “It’ll just be-”

But then Nico was opening the door, and came face to face with - 

“A guard,” Nico said. 

“Uh,” the guard replied.

Nico recognised him, just barely. 

He was a taller man with dark hair and a soft looking jaw, dressed like most of the guards of the house did when they were just finishing a shift. His helmet was tucked underneath his arm, buckles unstrapped and collar loosened. 

Nico had never been in the habit of getting to know any guard more than was necessary. He had no reason to know his name, but he had a suspicion he knew why he was here. 

“This is-” Hazel started.

“Hazel was concerned there was a, uh-” the man said at the same time. Nico looked back at Hazel.

“A thief,” she said, stepping forward next to her cousin.

Nico glanced between the two of them, both flushing, fidgeting slightly. The guard looked uncomfortable, but he hadn’t even noticed he had called the Lady of the house by her first name. 

“Just me,” Nico said, looking between the two figures again. They both looked at him, like they had forgotten he was there.

“Thank you, Frank,” Hazel said, finally, turning to the guard and smiling warmly at him. 

He could see a smile on Hazel’s face that seemed small. Private. 

Nico wanted to roll his eyes, tease his cousin, his best friend, but - 

“I should be going,” he said. 

“No need!” Frank said, jumping back to attention. He looked at Hazel, and could tell she was embarrassed.

“Okay, well, I have work to do,” he said. “So I _will_ be leaving.”

“I can make sure you-”

“No need,” he said, stepping out of the room and darting around the guard, starting down the hall. “Keep an eye on the Lady though, eh?” 

“Uh,” Frank said. Nico smiled, wanting to laugh at the mortified face Hazel made behind his back. 

He ducked into the dark of the shadows, ready to slip down the corridors to his own room, but he paused, covered in dark, to look back at Hazel. 

It looked as though she had been rolling his eyes at his retreating back, but she looked back at Frank now, and laughing as he flushed. She reached her hand out to pull him into her room, and the smile on her face was unguarded. Happy. 

Nico smiled.

Let them each steal a piece of happiness where they could. 

☽☼☾

Once the door to his bedroom was firmly shut, lock in the door turned to offer the barest amount of security, Nico moved to the window. It was small, unlike the large bay windows designed to let light into the nicer bedrooms below, but he could hoist himself up onto the wooden slat lying below it. He curled into himself, and turned his eyes towards the stars. 

The sun had started to rise, and soon, Nico would shuffle off to sleep. But he could still see stars, just barely, and he had time.

He pulled out the collection of trinkets and items he had lifted from Will’s bedroom. 

Taking from Will was confusing, and he didn’t know why. He had no reason to feel bad taking something from a royal - they had more than enough left over. 

But there was something about taking from Will, that caused his head to spin. He had only been kind to him, offering him tea, offering him his  _ ring.  _

He shook the thought from his head.

Now was not the time to develop a conscience. 

He sifted through the collected items lying before him. A few coins, a brooch, a bottle of  _ something - _

And letters. 

Except for the first, each time he’d seen Will had been in his parlour. They hadn’t been in his bedroom, and Nico hadn’t been able to rifle through his desk, but there had been letters tucked under a book at the front of the room and Nico had - 

He had taken them. 

They were opened, like Will had tore them open to read and then dropped them in a frustrated heap, but Nico had no idea how much he had absorbed before setting them down. 

The seal at the top was unmistakable, though. 

He had seen it time and time again, as recently as the day before, in the office of a junior advisor, on a letter Nico had surreptitiously tucked into his coat sleeve. 

He read through the letter in his hand once more, stomach twisting, until he reached the end. He looked down at the signature, gut souring at the looping letters beneath a neatly printed name, and read it again from the start. 

_ Dear William,  _

_ I’m glad to hear from you again!  _

_ I’ve been spending more time riding, and I’m sure you aren’t as bad as you say you are when it comes down to it. I can imagine even a Prince has time to take off, to go for a ride with a Lady?  _

_ I’d love to hear more about the studies you’re undertaking between your training. I’m not too familiar myself with the amount of time it takes to be brought up to rule a family, let alone a kingdom, but know I will soon.  _

_ Hope to see you soon.  _

_ With love,  _ _   
_ _ Hazel  _

He kept his mind carefully blank as he folded up the letter and slipped it into his breast pocket, before turning to look over the other pieces he had taken from the castle. 

The brooch was a sun, a shining gold with something gleaming and bright set into the centre. Nico ran his finger over it, feeling the bumps and ridges and surprising warmth of it, from the time it had spent being pressed into his coat. 

He looked up at the stars, and continued to drag his skin over the brooch, and didn’t think about the letter. 

☽☼☾

The seal was worth it. 

The seal  _ had  _ to be worth it. 

It was worth all of the ducking and crouching and hiding in the twisting, trailing path through the castle. It was worth all the waiting, in dark, disused service corridors, in the cold air with fingers grasping brick, until Will’s room was blessedly empty and Nico could slip in through the walls or the windows. It was worth all the long nights standing still while he waited to be absolutely sure it was clear, even when he wanted nothing more than to fidget and move.

It had to be worth it. 

He was in it for the long run, now, with all the effort he had put into this. He would see some damn pay off, if it was the last thing he did. 

But even without the promise of money - and god, was there promise - Nico was going to get that ring.

He shoved down his thoughts as he popped open the door to the parlour room, marked with a neat white cross a few weeks before, when Nico had first found the right route. 

Will looked up from the book he had been reading through, grinning when he saw Nico. 

“Evening,” he said, and Nico nodded, stepping further into the room and perching on the window sill. He still wasn’t keen on sitting down on the excessively plush cushions Will thought counted as chairs. He would be fine where he was, in reaching distance of a fast exit. 

“How have you been since we last met?” Will continued, and Nico rolled his eyes. But he knew the drill, at this point, and answering questions with more of his own would only drive them in circles. 

“Incredibly busy,” he said. He wasn’t lying. 

“Work?” 

“No one else to do it,” he said, nodding. No one as good as him, at least.

“Is it a lonely profession, then?” Will asked.

“Now and then,” he replied, shrugging. 

“But you have friends, surely,” he said, and Nico nodded. 

“I do,” he said.

“They must be a delight to manage living with you,” he noted, and Nico rolled his eyes. 

“More so than you,” he said, and Will smiled.

“And family?” 

He chewed his lip, thinking. 

This wasn’t what he had expected to be asked about, when he made the deal, but he had quickly gotten used to the fact he could never know what to expect from the man before him.

“I do,” he said, finally. He thought of Hazel’s warm skin and dark eyes, and Frank, and her letter. He thought about Reyna, and Jason - not blood relatives, but they were all thick as thieves, and that was its own kind of family, in a way. 

“Are they in the same- line of work as you?” Will asked. Nico shrugged.

“Give or take.” 

Will continued to press him, pushing the boundaries just a bit further with each question. What do they do? Do you work together? Do they work nearby?

“Why don’t you answer any of my questions?” Nico asked, finally, cutting Will off before he could ask something else. 

Will blinked.

“Was that part of the deal?”

“Would you refuse?”

Will smiled, and shook his head. 

“I think it’s fair,” he said. “What do you want to know?”

Nico paused, thinking. He had been thinking for a long time, mind turning over what he knew about Will and soft written words; “ _ With love, Hazel. _ ”

“Why do you want me here?” he asked. Will blinked. “What do I know that your millions of advisors don’t?”

Will looked down at his silver cup, nearly empty, and didn’t meet Nico’s eye as he spoke. 

“You won’t lie to me,” he said, like he knew it, as a fact. Nico’s gut soured. “You have no reason to sugar coat anything, or to tell me the monarchy is the best thing to come out of society.”

“It definitely isn’t,” Nico muttered, and Will laughed. 

“Exactly,” he said. “You won’t lie,” he said again, and Nico was starting to get what he meant. 

“What do you want from me?”

“Stories,” he said. “To hear about the world. What it would be like if I wasn’t a Prince.”

“What would you do if you weren’t a Prince, though?” Nico asked.

“Well, I always wanted to be a doctor,” he said. “The infirmary isn’t the  _ place for royal blood _ , apparently, but if I actually learn a bit about my people, I can do something to help, instead of-”

He fell quiet, looking down at the floor, and Nico looked at him. 

He watched the candlelight flicker against his warm skin, illuminating every freckle, ever mark, on his face. 

He was a man that deserved every good thing, Nico thought, and didn’t press himself to think through it any further.

“Did you have any other questions, then?” Will said, too chipper.

Nico’s chest ached.

“Come now, you don’t want to know anything?” Will said, pressing him, like he was desperate for the silence to be filled. 

“How do you always keep finding me?” Nico asked. 

Will fell quiet, and Nico watched as he thought.   


“Perhaps you aren’t giving me enough credit,” Will said. “I’m used to a silent room, so another body - it’s obvious.”

“I’m definitely not giving you enough credit,” Nico said. “You’re just a Prince, after all.”

“I think it’s my turn again,” Will said, grinning as he spoke, and Nico shifted on the windowsill, fiddling with the strap on his boots as he got comfortable. 

“Tea?” Will asked, again, sounding like he expected him to say no, but asked again and again, even though Nico had never said yes, out of a habit forged in a very particular type of upbringing.

But Nico hesitated, longer than he usually would when a man as rich as Will offered him anything. 

Will looked his way, eyebrow raised. Nico slid off the marble window sill and wandered over to the centre of the room, dropping down onto the sofa. 

A cup of tea couldn’t hurt. 

“I’d love some,” he said, and Will smiled. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yell about SolAngelo and get fic updates on tumblr @ americanbeautiies


	3. shadow and light

Nico watched a young woman slide a pocket watch from the suit of a man dressed far too nice for the pub they were in, and said nothing. 

It looked like a nice watch, as far as he could tell, made of heavy silver. It would fetch a hefty price, selling it in the right part of town. 

The man was rich, then, and all too eager for her hand to slip into his coat, even with the wedding band on his left hand glinting in the dim light. 

Nico ignored it.

“Prompt as ever,” a voice said, drawing him from his thoughts. 

And then there were bodies on either side of him, knocking into his shoulder despite the many times he had said he hated it when they did. 

Thalia just grinned, setting a drink down in front of him that he accepted, graciously. At her side, Annabeth was shuffling down the bench. 

On his other side were Percy and Jason, chattering mindlessly to each other as they had been doing more and more frequently. Percy nudged his shoulder against Nico’s, and Nico forced himself to ignore it.

“I think you’re all just late,” he said. 

It was a weekend, or, as much of a weekend any of them could have when they worked any night they were called on. 

They were in a similar line of work, each one of them, even if their skill sets varied wildly, with a sliding scale of legality. He knew Annabeth, for example, was just slightly less willing than he was to commit crimes, but God help them all if she ever changed her mind. 

But Thalia and Percy did much the same work as Reyna and Jason for different families, even if Nico wasn’t entirely confident he knew what any of it entailed. They could fight their way out of anything stronger and better than he could, with decent skills in picking pockets, but, as far as he knew, it was a job better kept  _ vague.  _

None of them were thieves, and he never truly felt like he belonged when they all came together. Working alone suited him just fine, thank you very much. 

But he couldn’t deny their own skills came in handy at times, too. 

“Have you heard the rumours about the crown?” Percy asked, leaning in close. The others followed him imperceptibly, eager to hear gossip, and not keen to be overheard. “Everyone thinks the Prince has a suitor.”

“We’re talking about the older Prince, right? Not the younger one?” Thalia asked. She had drawn her foot up to rest against the bench she sat at, and Nico could see the barmaid sending her a dirty glare. 

“The blond one,” Percy said, nodding. “I always forget there’s more than one.”

“Isn’t the other one like, a child, anyway?” Jason asked. 

“Yeah,” Percy said. “And if we’re discussing a sex scandal, we can at least stick to talking about an adult.”

“A sex scandal?” Jason said. “Our Prince?”

Nico raised an eyebrow. It was the first Will had ever mentioned anything of it, if true, and he felt a flicker of discomfort shoot through his stomach at the idea. He had no reason to tell a man hellbent on robbing him, so there was no reason for Nico  _ to  _ know, but even so. 

He couldn’t imagine Will having that sort of dalliance with anyone, unless -

An icy chill went through him. 

They couldn’t mean - 

“Visits in the night?” Thalia asked, and Nico went very carefully still. His companions laughed.

“What a scandal, for a Prince,” Percy said. 

“I think we’d have heard if there was that kind of scandal,” Annabeth said. “I heard it was more of a  _ Lady,  _ but no one knows who or when.”

“I wish I gave as much of a shit about the love lives of royals as some of the rich fuckers do,” Thalia said. 

“You don’t give a shit about any love life, point blank,” Annabeth said. Thalia tipped her cup her way, nodding. 

“I care about you all having a nice, happy time,” she said, “Even if I have to hear about you,” she nodded at Percy, “getting it on with my stupid little brother.” 

Jason let out a shout, offended and flushing red, but the others just laughed. 

“Or if it involves Reyna,” Nico muttered, schooling his face away from surprise as the table erupted into cackling laughter. He hadn’t known that Jason and Percy were still -

“Are you one to talk, Nico?” Annabeth asked, and four pairs of eyes turned towards him. He flushed.

And without considering it, Nico thought about Will. 

He thought about night after night in his parlour, lit by dim candlelight with warm, honey tea. 

Perhaps he was sneaking out enough to make people suspicious. Perhaps everyone did think he had a secret lover, but he only had - 

Will. 

Their Prince. 

“That’s a face of someone with a fellow in mind,” Percy laughed, leaning against him. Nico did his best not to flush, to ignore the warmth against his skin. 

“Just because you don’t want to expand on what your evenings with Jason-”

“ _ Please,”  _ Thalia said, cutting him off. “I beg you.”

Nico laughed, and the table did too, letting conversation flow for the rest of the evening, until eventually, catching his eye on the clock behind the bar, Nico realised he had somewhere to be. 

“I have to go,” he said, pushing himself up to stand. The table booed him. 

“Come on-”

“Errands to run,” he said, cutting them off. Percy snorted. 

“Is that what we’re calling it these days?” 

“Apparently,” Nico replied. “See you all later,” he said, before slipping out behind the table and ducking into the crowd seamlessly, out the door before they could reply.

He spent the walk back wondering how true the rumors could be. 

He knew better than to dismiss anything out of hand - rumors were a currency he was fluent in handling, and took a good deal of his winnings from them.

But Will would have told him. Surely. If he was set to be matched with someone -

It seemed like something that would come up.

Surely. 

☽☼☾

He popped open the hidden door into Will’s parlour, grabbing it with gloved hands quickly to avoid it swinging open too hard, and stepped through into the light.

Will looked up from where he sat in the centre of the room and smiled, a wide grin that Nico still felt surprised to see directed his way. 

“You’re early,” Nico said, glancing at the clock. 

“Can I be early to my own room?” Will asked. Nico nodded.

“I think you can, if you’re usually so late,” he said. Will laughed.

He was curled up on the sofa in the centre of his parlour, teacup in hand, and hands wrapped around the silver in a way that felt to Nico distinctly unroyal but so naturally  _ Will _ . 

They had both relaxed in each others’ presence, as time had gone on. It had been a couple of weeks at most, but with frequent visits, it had become startlingly easy to fall into their own sort of rhythm. He no longer felt the need to jump onto talking business, answering questions, asking after the seal. 

He could just - be, for a bit, in a way he couldn’t with anyone else. 

Silence would stretch across Will’s parlour, a welcome rest for both parties between the day to day stresses that had piled on them both. Will, curled up on the sofa with tea, even late into the night. Nico, anywhere in the room he chose - the sofa, the windowsill, or on his feet, wandering in loops around the room.

“I was able to speak with the doctors, today,” Will said, a while after he had arrived.

Will seemed excited, now that he had been reminded of whatever it was he had wanted to say, and Nico let himself listen.

His voice was warm. Comfortable. 

He had slipped off his gloves and his bare hands trailed the bookcases now, rising and falling where the shelf had been carved and engraved. He had taken to looking through the books and pamphlets Will stocked his room with, searching for something to give Hazel. 

His eyes darted over the gilded leather spines, taking in the words only superficially, and letting their meaning filter out as Will talked. They caught on a title, one he’d seen Hazel reading, with the same gilt binding, almost identical to her copy.

“My mother found out, though,” Will said, drawing Nico’s attention back to him, and -

Nico just couldn’t understand how Will could ever want for anything. Not because he was rich, a prince, but because - who could say no to him?

Nico watched him ponder his thoughts, before he looked up and caught his eye, only just seeming to notice Nico had stopped walking.

“What?” he asked.    


“What happened?” Nico asked. “With your mother?”

“Nothing,” Will said, finally, but he grimaced. “I doubt I’ll be able to go back any time soon.”

Nico nodded, and continued his loop around the room. He was about to sit down, when his eyes caught on something he hadn’t seen in the room before.

It was shining and brilliant, sitting on the table next to Will, almost careless, even in the presence of a thief. 

It was a necklace. 

The necklace was made of gleaming gold, shined to perfection, and likely cost an absolute fortune. In the centre sat a perfectly cut red gem, shining and reflecting the candlelight that burned above it.

“This is beautiful,” Nico said, stepping over to it so he could run his hands over the golden inlay. 

“You are  _ not  _ allowed to steal that,” Will said, and Nico laughed.

“Never what you want to say to a thief,” he said. “We’re very petty.”

“Would it help if I said please?” Will said.

“Is it a gift?” he asked, turning to look up. Will had shifted to focus on the necklace, and he shrugged. 

“Of sorts,” he said. 

“To you? I wouldn’t think it was your style,” he said. Will laughed, but it sounded hollow, like his heart wasn’t truly in it. 

“No,” he said. “It’s just a small thing, anyway, nothing important.”

Nico would disagree that it could be considered in any way  _ small, _ but he knew a plea to end a conversation better than most. He let it drop, allowing his fingers to glance just once over the gem, before moving to sit back down across from Will. 

“I’ve talked about myself too much,” Will said. “How are you?”

“Busy,” he said, shrugging. Will huffed.

“You say that  _ every  _ night. Do you not rest?”

“There’s hardly time,” Nico replied. 

“No time off? No friends?” he asked. Nico shrugged, again. “What do the people do for fun, then? Or is it all work, all the time?” Will asked. 

“What do you mean,  _ fun _ ?” Nico asked. “What do  _ you  _ do for fun?” 

He watched Will think it over, fingernail tapping gently against the cup in his hand. 

“Balls, I suppose. We dance, and drink, that sort of thing.”

“Poor people drink.”

“And dancing?”

“Ugh,” Nico replied. “ _ Dancing.” _

“Do people not dance?” Will asked, sounding so, so genuine. “At all?”

“People dance,” Nico said. “It’s just that  _ I  _ don’t.”

Will huffed, a laugh of sorts, but then, to Nico’s horror, he was standing, stepping towards Nico and drawing him up with a loose grip circling his small wrist. 

“Will, what are you-”

“We’re dancing,” he said, ignoring Nico as he shook his head, “Come on. We’re dancing.”

“You’re  _ insane, _ ” Nico said, but he couldn’t find it in himself to fight as Will stepped away from the table and chairs, and drew Nico with him. 

“We usually waltz - do people waltz?”

“I wouldn’t know,” Nico said. “Like I said, I don’t-”

“Okay, hush,” Will said. Nico snorted. 

But then Will was dropping his hand onto Nico’s waist, firm and broad and  _ warm  _ and his breath caught like he had never been touched by another human before.

Will clasped his other hand in his, drawing them both up until they were level with Nico’s shoulder. 

“Now,” Will said, and his voice had dropped until it was a quiet tenor, floating in the space between them. Nico fought to pay attention as he spoke, “Follow my lead. It’s simple.”

He adjusted Nico’s stance, bringing him closer to his own chest and he was warm, so warm, and standing so  _ close _ , but Nico - 

He hated it. 

He loved it. 

He  _ hated  _ how much he loved it. 

Will was moving him, slowly, counting quietly as he stepped once, twice, and Nico followed him, clumsily, face flushing as Will laughed. 

“That’s it,” he said, just barely a murmur, as Nico started to move his feet in time with his, “Good.”

Nico smiled, heart fluttering. 

If Reyna knew - 

He brushed the thought off, determined not to think. 

He fixated on the feeling of his hands. 

Will’s broad, warm hands; one hand on his, the other on his waist. 

His hands, his hands, his - 

He looked up at Will and startled when he saw him staring back, looking so -  _ fond.  _ For just a moment, before he realised Nico had caught him looking. He stumbled, kicking Nico’s ankle with his foot once, and cursed.

Nico bit the inside of his cheek, breath catching as their hands dropped between them, suddenly halting to a stop like clockwork that had broken. 

Will cleared his throat and stepped back, taking his hands with him.

Nico didn’t say anything. 

Will looked stilted, and Nico felt much the same, but he kept quiet, willing heat down from his cheeks, like he had any control over it whatsoever. He watched Will fidget with the ring on his pinky, his seal ring, and his hands - 

Nico felt himself fall carefully quiet, as the thought of Will’s hands repeated over and over in his head, with no hope of letting it go.

“We can call it a night there,” Will said, finally, and his voice was quiet, far too quiet. “I have an early morning, tomorrow, and…”

He trailed off into silence. 

Nico thought about his hands, and nodded. His eye caught one last time on the necklace, across the room, and he turned away, pointedly, distracted by too many thoughts.

“I’ll see you in a few days,” Nico offered, and Will said nothing. 

Silently,  _ awkwardly, and  _ still thinking about his hands, Nico moved to the window. He glanced back once to see Will turned away, eyes caught on something across the room, in the direction of that bright, beautiful piece of jewellery that Nico tried not to think about. 

He paused for just a moment longer, and Will didn’t look back. 

☽☼☾

It wasn’t often that he was sent out on the same job as someone else, but he didn’t always find himself minding the company. He would sneak into an empty home, while Jason - 

He didn’t want to know what Jason got up to.

It was a simple enough format, really, and Nico rarely ever minded, but in the foggy evening at one of the quieter ends of town, Nico couldn’t shake the feeling of being  _ supervised _ . 

The two of them stood together, now, tucked off of the main road in the shadows of one of the many alleys that crisscrossed the city. Nico had crouched to the ground, elbows resting over his knees, as Jason leant against a brick wall.

“So, you and Percy,” Nico said, trying to get over the feeling of apprehension. He looked up to see Jason roll his eyes.

“Don’t you start on this too,” he muttered. Nico laughed. 

“I didn’t know that was still happening.”

“It-”

Nico watched him sigh, on the edge of too loud. He waited, as Jason fidgeted.

“You know how he is with Annabeth,” he said, finally. Nico nodded. It had been a thorn in his chest for a long time. 

He knew.

“You don’t have to settle for fooling around -”

“It’s not-” Jason said, cutting him off. “It’s not just fooling around. He’s- It’s just complicated.”

Nico looked away. He already regretted asking.

“What about Thalia and Reyna?” he asked, switching the subject for both of their benefits. Jason grimaced, likely unhappy to be thinking about anything to do with his sister’s romantic entanglements. 

“Neither of them are very - forthcoming, with romance. But that suits them just fine, so, I guess they made it work.”

Nico laughed, and heard Jason chuckle with him. At least that was working out.

“What about you?” Jason asked. 

“What about me?” 

“I know you used to-”

“ _ Used  _ to,” he said, sharper than strictly necessary. Jason didn’t need to finish the sentence to make it clear what he meant. Nico could feel eyes on him, and willed himself not to look. “I’m not jealous of you, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Jason made a noise, and Nico chanced a glance up to look at him. He had looked away, now. 

“I want you to be happy,” he said. “And if that can happen without romance, great. But if there’s something you want-”   


“Because you’re an expert on that?” 

“Listen,” Jason said. Nico let the corner of his mouth twitch up, almost a smile. “We know you’ve been out more, lately. Is that...”

Nico thought back to warm, broad hands, on his waist, clutching his palm. He thought back to dancing, in silence, in a room that wasn’t his, with a man that -

He stopped, startled at the thought that sprung to mind, without his realising. 

With a man that  _ could never be his.  _

“It’s nothing,” he said, sharper than he needed to. 

Will was a friend - an unlikely friend, to be sure, but a  _ friend.  _ No one he ever needed to be  _ his. _

He could feel Jason staring at him, and refused to look. 

“There they are,” Jason murmured, finally. Nico looked up at where he had nodded, eyes catching on a figure across the road from them, exiting a tall brick house. “I’ll go follow.”

“Sure,” Nico said. Jason glanced back at him. 

“Don’t-” he started, but trailed off. Nico watched, quiet, as Jason swallowed. “Don’t tell him, okay?” 

“Course not,” he said, and Jason grinned, looking far too relieved. 

“See you on the other side.”

☽☼☾

“I want to leave,” Will said. 

Nico looked up from the book he had been reading, startled. 

He had been there for a good few hours, tonight, but after an extended conversation on alcohol prices relative to essential purchases in the towns, they had lapsed into another comfortable quiet. Nico had found a book of old lore, and had curled himself up on the windowsill to read.

“What?” he asked, trying to refocus on what Will had said, as absurd as it was. “Are you -  _ what?” _

“Not forever,” he corrected, which clarified, only just. “Just- a night. Out of the castle. With you.”

Nico raised an eyebrow. 

“Are you insane?” he asked, deadly serious, but WIll only laughed, like it had been a joke. 

“You’ve been coming in and out for how long? Surely you can slip me out through the tunnels for an evening.”

“Yes, because I’m  _ trained, _ ” he said. “No offense, but you’re-”

“Nico,” he said, and Nico stopped, mind going blank the way it always did when he heard Will say his name. “Please.”

They stared each other down, but Nico felt himself waver. He looked out the window at his side, as if looking away from Will would steel his resolve.

God, he was getting soft. 

He was altogether too keen to entertain stupid, foolish decisions, for no reason at all. Just because Will asked nicely, once -    


“Why?” he asked, finally, looking back up. It was Will’s turn to look away.

“I-” he started, but stopped himself short. “I won’t be free to do stupid things forever. I’ve never- and I just -” He sighed, looking back up and catching Nico’s eye, and Nico felt his breath stutter. 

“I would feel safe with you,” Will said, and Nico - 

Nico never had a damn hope in saying no.

“Okay,” he said. “Not tonight. But - next time.” 

Will smiled, soft and warm, bright, and Nico looked away, too quickly.

He ducked out of the castle through the tunnels earlier than usual, that night, using the excuse that he had to go and plan Will’s extravagant evening out, eyes rolling as he spoke, but not fully meaning it. 

It was almost startling to realise how quickly his fondness for Will had grown. 

Will was waiting when he next came back, earlier than he ever was. He grinned as Nico appeared.

“Ready?” he asked. Will nodded, standing to move towards him. He looked - giddy. 

“Wear this,” Nico said, handing him a dark, ratty cloak. “And leave anything  _ silk. _ ” __

“I’m nervous,” Will said, chuckling just once, lightly, as he shucked his embroidered cardigan in favour of the thick cotton Nico offered him. Nico felt his own pulse flutter, eyes catching on the strip of skin under Will’s tunic as it lifted with his arms. 

“It’ll be fine if you shut up for once,” he muttered, instead, and Will laughed. 

“We can’t go anywhere where people know who you are,” Nico explained, once they were well hidden in the shadows and insulated walls of the tunnels. So long as he avoided the corridors that lead past bedrooms, offices, parlours - even Will should be able to get through undetected. 

He hoped.

“Unfortunately, people know you everywhere,” he continued. 

Will laughed, too loud, and Nico felt panic spike in his stomach, turning over his shoulder to shoot Will a sharp glare. He shut his mouth, and Nico forced himself to  _ focus. _

It had been uncomfortably quiet, moving through tunnels knowing there was another person with him, but they had managed, and he could see the relative light of the night through a thick metal grate ahead. 

He paused when he got to it, hands on the latch he had broken long ago. 

“Are you okay?” Will asked. Nico jumped. He hadn’t heard him come so close, but he could feel his breath against his shoulder. 

“Fine,” he said, shoving down the apprehension that had been stalking down the corridors with him. 

He pushed the grated entrance open, and led Will out into the world. 

“It’s- nothing  _ busy,  _ because you’d be recognised-” he said, suddenly feeling foolish. Like he had disappointed Will, and ruined his first trip into the world properly. 

God forbid he ever disappointed Will. 

“Oh,” Will breathed. 

Nico stopped, looking up at him. 

He had paused, gaping up at the trees that surrounded them. They were just barely on the other side of the walls surrounding the castle, but the trees were already different. They were bigger, perhaps, more natural. 

They framed the sky above, and Nico could see twinkling stars through their branches.

“There’s a lake, ahead,” he said. Will nodded, allowing him to lead the way over knobbly roots and overgrown weeds.

Nico watched Will, like he had been watching him the whole time he had known him. Closely, like he was at risk of disappearing and doing something absurdly stupid. 

But here, now, in the open space of the world beyond the castle walls, he looked enraptured. His eyes skimmed over the dark water before them with rapt attention, while Nico’s eyes watched him. The moon wasn’t full, but it shone down with silver light nonetheless, offering a sharp contrast between shadow and light. 

Nico could see it on Will’s face, and watched him, silent.

“Let’s go in,” Will said, suddenly. Nico blinked. 

“Are you-”

“Come on,” he was saying, and then - _ oh, fuck,  _ Nico thought - he was shucking the cloak he had been given, followed by his shirt, his  _ trousers -  _

“Will, you can’t-”

But he turned, in nothing but a pair of shorts, and grinned, reaching out to clasp Nicos’ hand in his, and tugging. 

“My god,” Nico muttered. Will laughed. 

“Just me,” he said. 

Nico’s heart fluttered.

“Let me take off my clothes, at  _ least, _ ” he said, finally, and Will cheered, too loud for the night, but not caring. Nico rolled his eyes, but couldn’t find it in himself to care, either as he slid his cloak off his shoulders, followed by his boots, his shirt, his trousers - 

Will’s hand was around his wrist once more, warm and tight, and then he was tugging forward hard and making Nico stumble. 

He gasped as his feet splashed into the shallow shores of cold water, and Will laughed, bright and wonderful. He splashed water up towards him, getting his hair wet.

He let Will tug him deeper, teeth chattering with each new step until his feet picked up off the bottom of the lake. Until they were both floating gently, treading water. Until they were in the middle of a shockingly cold lake in the middle of the night - a thief and a prince that never should have met. 

Their hands were linked, still, and Nico could feel how warm Will was, like he was radiating heat through the chilly water.

“I’m surprised you can swim,” Nico said, shivering in the cold. 

“We used to visit family in the countryside, when I was a child,” Will said, not elaborating on it in a way that Nico could tell was practised. “I’m surprised  _ you  _ can swim,” he said in return. 

Nico thought to his mother, his sister, to Hazel, and long days in the sun as a child. With his father, too, sometimes, but it had always been - 

“My mother,” he said, quietly. “She brought us swimming as children.”

“Us?” Will asked. He seemed - serious. Such a far cry from all the nights where he was warm and bright in the centre of his parlour, laughing, and asking banal questions that didn’t make any sense.

This was new territory, altogether.

“My sister,” he said. “And my cousin, sometimes, but mainly my sister. Bianca.”

“Is she also- ” Will said, but he shut his mouth. Nico could hear the unspoken question lingering in the air between them.  _ Is she also thief? _

Will was quiet, and he let Nico be quiet, too. Like the quiet was a shield cast over them to help them float. Like a bubble, keeping them safe from the outside world, just so long as they kept words unsaid.

“She died,” Nico said, finally. Will nodded, saying nothing. “They both did. Bianca, and Mamma, when I was younger. I live - with my uncle, now,” he said, surprised at the ease with which the truth came out. 

No one knew he was the nephew of Lord Levesque. And yet - 

He had told Will he lived with his uncle, without any hesitation.

“I can’t imagine losing my brother and sister,” Will said, finally. “I’d be a wreck.”

Nico nodded, struggling to swallow the sharp knot in his throat that accompanied memories of Bianca, of his mother. 

“I was. My cousin helped me through it, at the time. She- I don’t know what I would have done, otherwise.”

“Do you still get to see her? Your cousin?” he asked, and Nico felt himself smile. He missed Bianca, every day, and Hazel was never a  _ replacement.  _ She was just another person who Nico loved and cared for. 

“Every day,” he said. 

“That’s good,” Will said.

He smiled, and Nico’s heart stuttered, eyes catching on the twitch of his lips in a second. 

Somehow, imperceptibly, without Nico realising, Will had floated closer.

Nico could feel the brush of his feet near his through the water, could feel the warmth of his skin even through the water that separated them. 

His heart beat harder, and Will floated closer still. His gentle movements disrupted the water around them, making waves in the surface that faintly reflected the starlight above.

“Nico, I-”

“Will-” 

Nico blinked, startled as they spoke over each other. He could see Will swallow, but he only nodded, as if asking Nico to speak first. 

He swallowed. 

There were so many things he could say, that he wanted to say, and do. He could just float closer, and - 

“We should get out, before we catch a cold,” he said.

He felt - quiet. He watched Will for any sign of disappointment, for any hint of what he had been about to say, but he only nodded, like that was what he was going to say, too. 

“Yeah,” he said. 

Nico glanced at the sky as they trudged ashore, grimacing. The stars above had started to fade.

“We should go back, soon,” he said, turning to Will. “If you get-”

“Who’s there?” a voice called, sharp and sudden. Nico startled, and his eyes shot to Will, looking at him as he glanced back with wide eyes. 

He had been caught completely unaware, and that was a terrifying thought in itself. He was with a  _ mark,  _ and he - 

Will was moving, faster than Nico would have expected him to. 

He grabbed a cloak from the ground to wrap around himself, and Nico was confused for a split second before Will opened the cloak and wrapped it around him too. 

And then he was being tugged to the ground, hard, but instead of landing on the hard dirt floor of the lakeside, he was collapsing onto- 

Will. 

“What are you-”   


“ _ Sh _ ,” Will whispered, sharp, practically authoritative, like the Prince Nico had known was there all along, but rarely ever saw. 

Nico grit his teeth in an effort to stay quiet, to keep his composure. He could still feel Will beneath him, warm and damp, and -

Will’s hand shot out to his head, clasping the back of his skull hard and pulling it towards him. His face connected with the divot of Will’s neck, and Nico gasped, breath shifting sudden against Will’s collarbone. It was still damp with water, and Nico grit his teeth.

Someone huffed, far  _ closer  _ than they had been a mere moment ago. Turning his head to the side, without looking up, Nico could see a pair of boots. 

They were standing, he realised with dawning horror, over his trousers. 

“Bratty kids,” the man muttered. “This isn’t a place to be fooling around. Get yourselves home, this is private property.”

“Sorry, sir,” Will said, voice low, far lower than it usually was. Nico had to stop himself from snorting. “We’ll be right on our way, sir.”

But the man above them only rolled his eyes, scoffing with something that could have been disgust, or amusement, before grumbling and walking away.

They lay on the ground for a minute, then another, not moving in the silence of the world, until - 

Nico let the weight and tension from his body slip, laughing incredulously against Will’s shoulder. 

“How on  _ earth  _ did that work?” he said, but Will only shrugged, beneath him, and laughed. 

“A miracle,” he breathed out. Nico shivered, as Will’s words ghosted over his shoulders.

And then he startled, realising with shocking clarity that he was mostly naked, atop the Crown Prince of the realm - who was also mostly naked, and soaking wet. 

He pushed himself up too fast, and cleared his throat. Will followed suit, not looking at him. 

They dressed in silence. 

“Goodnight, Nico,” Will said, nearly an hour later, as Nico ducked out of the window onto the cool stone of the window ledge. 

He had returned Will safely to his room, both of them still damp. The trek through the hidden corridors of the castle felt longer on the way back, but it might have been because he was bone weary, tired. 

The sky had begun to turn over into the hints of welcoming dawn, far later than Nico had ever left it. He knew he was running out of time to make his exit in time to get away safely. He knew he should have left straight from the woods. He knew this, and yet - 

He hadn’t wanted to leave Will.

He looked at Will as he shut the window, blond curls sticking to his face where they had yet to dry. 

He caught his eyes for a long moment through the thick glass. 

“Goodnight,” he said, and he hoped with his whole heart that Will had heard him.

☽☼☾

The sky was a light blue when he arrived back, the sun erring over the edge of the horizon. He slipped through the servant’s gate at the back of the estate towards the kitchen, moving to snatch up a piece of bread left over from the day before, before it got turned into breadcrumbs. 

A hand grabbed his shoulder. 

He turned to wrench his arm free before a figure cornered him against a wall, hand returning to his shoulder to press it against the stone wall. 

He looked up into the face of his assailant, and rolled his eyes. 

“Good morning, Reyna,” he said, shaking her hand off of his shoulder. It dropped, but she pressed closer, still crowding him against the wall.

“Where were you?” 

“The tavern.”

“Why are you  _ wet?” _

“I fell.”

“Into a fountain?”   


“Yeah,” he said.

“Nico,” she said, voice stern, and he ducked under her arm. 

“I wasn’t working,” he said, turning over his shoulder to keep watching her. “You know I wasn’t.” 

She said nothing, only watching him carefully. Like she was weighing up whether or not he was lying. Or whether it was worth calling him out on it.

He stopped, looking at her closely, as she stared him down. She looked - tense. 

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” she said, but she didn’t meet his eyes. “The ring-”

“It’s coming,” he said, cutting her off. “I have it under control.”

“Don’t do anything stupid,” she said. Nico rolled his eyes. 

“Give me some credit.”

“Nico,” she said. He looked at her, and she met his gaze, eyes dark and sharp. He fought not to look away, lest she take that as a victory. 

It felt like she could see through him entirely.

“Don’t be late tonight,” she said, finally, before turning and ducking out of the kitchen, and leaving Nico alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did I imply Poly Percy? Hell yeah I am 🙏
> 
> Yell about SolAngelo and PJO with me on Tumblr! @ americanbeautiies


	4. absolutely no self-preservation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two updates in one week! Hallelujah! No suspicious reason why I was keen to get this chapter out :) :) :)

The post had come. 

It sat neatly in an office at the front of the house, guarded well, but not well enough. 

Nico slipped out from behind the wardrobe tucked at the side of the room, where he had hidden the last time the guards switched over just a touch too slow. He could leave through the windows, now that he was in the silent, empty room. 

He was sure they knew he did this, but a habit was habit, and he moved slowly to avoid the floorboards he knew would creak.

It wasn’t the Lord’s office - not even Nico felt brave enough to go in there, not yet - but it was well decorated, and well used. He picked up an ornamental jade statue and slipped it into his jacket pocket. 

The mail was a fascinating place for information. It was a way to keep up to date with things that concerned him, when they would either take too long to get to him, or were held above his head for a misjudged sense of what anyone  _ needed  _ to know. 

Perhaps he didn’t need to know that the kitchen boy was writing love letters to the boy working in the castle stables, but he did enjoy it. 

He glanced at the clock, sitting atop the mantle of the fireplace in all of it’s mahogany glory. It had been five minutes already since he first snuck in. He knew the room went relatively unused after the sun had set, but wasn’t keen to press his luck. 

He moved along the desk, ducking down to see if there were any parcels, and stopped, surprised to hit a jackpot this early in the evening.

Tucked up against the legs of the desk was an ornamental box, with a piece of card laced to the top with golden ribbon. The card was thick, quality paper, with a royal seal emblazoned on it, and a name, scrawled in curling red ink that tickled at the back of Nico’s mind. 

It was addressed to Hazel.

It wasn’t unusual to find a royal seal in amongst the post, not when the Lord had as much money as he did. It was, however, strange to see Hazel’s name, even though he had seen a letter in her own hand addressed to the Crown Prince. 

But with a gift, as well?

Nico paused, crouching down to look at it more closely. 

The box was a dark stained wood, with artful carvings of emblems from the crown on the sides and atop the lid. A sun, a lyre, a chariot. Symbols Nico had seen decorated across Will’s parlour at every turn. There was gold leaf painted onto it, and something about the designs felt familiar to Nico. 

He didn’t know why, and he hated it.

He allowed his thumbs to trace just gently over the wooden carvings, before lifting the lid and peering inside. 

It was a necklace. 

More specifically, it was  _ Will’s  _ necklace. 

It was the necklace he had seen and touched and asked about in Will’s bedroom, identical, down to the glimmering golden band and the perfectly cut ruby. 

It was a gift from Will, packaged neatly and addressed to Hazel with a handwritten card tied to the top. 

Nico hand was reaching out for it before he realised he had moved, but his fingers drew to a stop just above the glimmering red stone, pressed into the centre of it. 

He couldn’t touch it.

This wasn’t something he could take. 

He covered it again, tucking it neatly back where he had found it and leaving the card unread, before stepping back and ducking out of the room. 

He felt a sharp twist in his chest as he left, and didn’t question it. 

☽☼☾

Nico had taken the high road, for once in his life. 

He knew many people who would be disappointed to discover that it was completely literal, darting on careful feet across the tiled roof of the castle. It wasn't a sign that he had done something as silly as be _nice._

He wasn’t sure how he had started running late that day. 

There had been a mark that seemed to have endless patience, never leaving the side of the earrings Nico had been sent to retriev, and the whole hassle of a bar fight where he had been trying so hard to listen in on a conversation. 

But here he was. Late, even after weeks of teasing Will for it, and ducking across the rooftop of the castle, like he owned the damn building. 

At this point, it was starting to feel like he did.

He slid down the tiles of a tower at the corner of the wing that housed Will’s bedroom, before dropping himself over the edge of it and falling silently onto the gantry below. He would have to walk along it before dropping again onto the window ledge to get to Will’s window. 

He looked over the roof to check where he was, and stopped still, breath catching in his throat.

It was darker than usual, with more stars out in the sky. Looking out over the wooded green grounds, and over even further to where he knew the lake was, Nico could see bright, twinkling stars dotting each square of the night sky.

And then there was the moon, shining directly down onto the man sitting below him. 

Looking down at Will, he forced himself to pause. To watch. 

His eyes were resting closed, just lightly, but his head tilted back like he was looking up, doing nothing more than stargazing. If they opened, he would see Nico in a second, but they didn't. For now, Nico could just watch, silent and unobserved. 

Will looked bright at the best of times, and Nico knew this, but he rarely saw him in light as pure as the white light from the moon. He looked like the sun, shining bright even in the dark.

He looked beautiful.

Nico forced himself to pull back. 

He sat down on the tiled roof, just a bare few feet above Will. He stayed quiet, like he always did, as thoughts swirled through his head unchecked. They were stuck, captured by the image of Will’s hands, clasped gently around a silver teacup, as always. 

He looked beautiful, and he looked _lonely._

Memories came easily, now, thinking back to every minute spent with Will where it seemed as though something had always been missing. From every question to every companionable silence, there had always been _something -_

He was lonely. 

Nico could recognise what Will was doing now, startlingly clear, because he knew it himself. It was a moment taken in isolation to relish the silence, forcing himself to enjoy it before it became tainted by the knowledge that perhaps, you weren’t alone by choice. 

His chest ached.

It didn’t usually hurt him to feel lonely. 

It made absolutely no sense that he would feel hurt seeing someone else feel it.

But Will was different, and he always had been. Nico knew that. Will had always been different. 

Will had looked twice, and seen him where no one else had. He had persisted in drawing Nico towards. In being his friend. 

His mind circled back to the necklace, with Hazel’s name on a card tucked into the beautiful carved box he had first seen in Will's room. 

He remembered where he recognised the scrawling hand, now. It matched the note he had given Nico when they had first spoken, on a tiny piece of paper Nico kept tucked in his jacket at all times, lest someone find out he had made a deal with a Prince.

His chest  _ ached.  _

He pushed himself up to stand and dropped down onto the ledge below.

Will swore, stumbling backwards into the room with a clatter, and Nico forced himself to laugh. 

As if he had just arrived. 

As if he hadn’t the slightest idea what Will had been doing. 

As if nothing was different. 

He was just the thief sent for a ring, making Will’s life difficult, after all.

Just a thief. He had no right to try and be anything but.

“My god,” Will said in a gasp. “ _ Nico. _ ”

He forced himself to move away from thoughts that rose alarmingly fast in his mind as Will said his name in a gasp. 

It was a fluke. It was nothing.

“Sorry I’m late,” he said instead, stepping around Will to sit on the chaise lounge in the centre of the room. He had been enough times, now, that he had come to appreciate that maybe, some cushions could be welcome.

“No, that’s okay,” Will said, turning to face him, but he didn’t come closer. Instead, he leant back against the window sill, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

Nico raised an eyebrow. 

“No questions, tonight?” he asked, hating the spike of fear that flickered in his stomach, sudden and unwelcome.

Will shook his head, and a tired smile crossed his face. Nico ached to ask him about what he had seen from the roof. To ask if he was okay, to tell him he didn’t need to be lonely, anymore, but - 

He had never been there to ask the questions. 

That was Will’s job, and Nico only answered, as honestly as he dared. Whenever he had asked something, it had been nothing more than a rebuttal, to waste his time or press him on their deal.  They had been always been stupid, and trivial; about the crown, about logistics. 

He hadn't once asked Will how he was. 

Nico could tell that he was itching to speak, now, and sat up taller, waiting.

He could wait for a long time, for Will.

“I think it’s time you get what you’re owed.”

Nico blinked. Will didn't look away. 

Now that he had spoken, Nico wished that he hadn’t. 

He knew that this day would come, but now that it was here, it all felt far, far too soon. 

He had deadlines, fast approaching. He had agreements. He had responsibilities. 

And yet this felt like a loss.

“Really?” he asked, unable to help himself. Will nodded. 

“You’ve done more than I asked, Nico,” he said, and Nico hated the way his mind curled around the whispering gasp with which Will said his name. With a soft  _ c  _ sound so unique to the way Will spoke.

“Okay,” he said. “I can-”

“You should stop coming here,” Will said, cutting him off with something dark curling in his eyes.

It hurt a lot more than Nico was expecting. 

He wasn’t sure  _ what  _ it was that he felt towards Will, but he knew that weeks spent looking at him as he rolled his eyes and laughed in delight, sneaking him out and floating through icy water towards him, being pulled down onto his chest, ballroom dancing - it had done something. 

It couldn’t be something as daft as love. He wasn’t that stupid.

But all the same, the thought of leaving the castle for the last time stung. 

“Of course,” he said, standing up from his seat and moving towards him. He watched Will’s hands as they delicately removed the ring that sat on his pinky finger, and then, just like that, it was in his hands. In his possession. 

He had done it.

“Thank you,” he murmured, a whisper, unable to speak any louder. He smiled at Will, a faint, soft thing, and Will returned it with as much tenderness.

“I think I might miss you,” Will said with a laugh, but it felt far from genuine, and Nico’s chest ached. 

“Maybe I’ll come back and rob you blind,” he said, instead of the words that rose in his brain. 

They wouldn’t see the light of day, and he had to be fine with that.

He nodded, because there was nothing else he could say. Will was silent, and Nico stepped around him with as much finality as he could muster, as he moved to the window. 

“Nico-”

He turned, too fast, and caught Will’s eye, trying not to fixate on the sound of his name falling from Will's lips. 

Will hesitated. He looked like he wanted to say something, like he was on the verge of stepping closer, and for just a second, Nico dared to hope. 

“Goodbye, Nico,” Will said, and Nico couldn’t help but repeat the sound of his name in Will’s mouth, that time. As if he could hold it in his mind, for as long as he lived.

But all he said was, “Goodbye, Will.” 

He pulled himself up onto the windowsill, crouching on cool marble like he had so many nights before. Putting his hand on the glass, he paused, daring to look back just once. 

Will’s eyes were on him.

Nico swallowed, and it felt hard. Will’s eyes were gleaming, shining bright as they reflected candle light, but he smiled, and Nico felt it in his bones.

“Thank you,” Will said, two words that encompassed far too much. 

Nico nodded, and stepped out into the dark. 

☽☼☾

He felt strange the entire way home. 

It was like a cloud had descended over him, curling fog through his brain that distracted him at every turn and made him lose his train of thought. 

It felt almost, but not quite, like sadness.

His brain played Will’s words over and over, trying to make sense of something that seemed determined to stay out of his grip, but he kept getting caught on the way the silvery light of the moon rained down on his face from the sky, and the way he had said his name. 

It hurt.

He felt the seal in his hand, held tight in his palm while he walked hunched into his coat. The ring felt heavy, like a constant presence. 

It was a stupid fucking idea to do anything  _ other  _ than go straight to Reyna and tell her he finally had it. 

And yet - 

The Levesque estate didn’t have such a thing as  _ loose ends.  _ They tied everything neatly at the end of a deal, or didn’t bother going through with it at all. They were hardly careless when it came to jobs as big as this one, and Nico knew what he was risking. The people paid to be dangerous knew what he was meant to do, and to keep something back from them was a risk to his own life.

But even knowing that at the core of his being, Nico had no urge to give the ring up. 

Not yet.

He paused outside the estate, almost startled to have arrived, already. 

A single window was lit up at the top of the house, even as the night stepped closer and closer to dawn. 

He paused, eyes catching.

Hazel’s dedication to learning anything and everything about the workings of the kingdom was scarily similar to the effort Nico would put into researching a mark. He liked to think she would know better than to get involved with the bullshit her father did, but he wouldn’t be surprised if she decided to take over. 

She had the dedication for it. 

He turned away, but stopped, catching movement in the window from the corner of his eye. 

Hazel had stood, moving out of the light from the candle and the thin gauzy lace drapped over the window. Nico watched, waiting, but after a short moment she returned, smiling brighter. 

She reached up and pulled the thick curtains closed, shutting herself, and . 

Nico’s heart ached.

“Nico.” 

He startled. 

He had been so focused on his cousin, and that sort of single sighted focus never did him any good.

He turned to the side, and there, shrouded in the darkness of a forgotten doorway, was Reyna. 

“Fuck,” he said, voice quiet, moving towards her. “What’s wrong?” 

“Not here,” she said, turning to glance over her shoulder. She ducked back into the dark and, wordlessly, like he always had, Nico followed her.

☽☼☾

“What the fuck, you guys.”

Reyna had led him through the shadows of the estate until they reached a dark, disused room at the corner of the house. It had been disused for as long as Nico could remember, by everyone other than a certain kind of staff employed at the estate.

Now, sitting at the broken table he had seen others tied to against their will, rather than seeing it from a spot tucked safely away in the shadows, Nico felt distinctly like he was under interrogation.

“We need the ring,” Reyna said.

“I don’t have the ring,” he said, the lie slicing through him as easy as anything else ever had. Reyna’s jaw clenched. “I'll get it _ ,  _ I swear-”

“Well, then, hurry up,” she said, voice cutting.

“What’s the rush?” he asked. Reyna and Jason glanced at each other, and Nico watched. He had seen those kind of looks countless times before, by people he worked with across the city. 

Something was about to break bad.

“What happened?” he asked, again, and Jason sighed.

“They’re up to something,” he said, glancing at Nico from his spot in the centre of the room. 

“And?” Nico asked, but the two just kept looking at him, stern looks on their faces that Nico was startled to recognise. 

The icy shiver of distrust.

“You think I’m in on it?” he snapped, arms crossing over his chest. At least they had had the good sense not to tie him down.

“What are we supposed to think? You’re out all hours, god knows where-”

“I’m  _ always  _ like that.”

“But you’re the best of us, Nico,” Reyna added, voice firm. “If he was going to pick anyone to start something, he would pick you.”

“Are you here on his orders?” 

“We aren’t,” Jason said, voice firm and almost - just barely - trustworthy. 

If Nico had less sense, he would trust him, but trust was a dangerous game. 

He watched as Jason glanced at Reyna, almost nervous, and Nico started to understand, piecing it together bit by bit.

“You’re going behind his back,” he said with a slow grin.

“We’re doing what’s best for the people we care about,” Reyna said.

“Nico, if you’re working against him-” Jason added. 

“Because you’re so loyal? Whispering about it in the dark?”

We are loyal. We just-” he broke off with a sigh, looking away from Nico at the ground, “We’re making sure that no one does anything stupid and gets themselves killed.”

Nico looked between them. 

He knew as well as they did that the Lord was more liberal than most in employing people that had distinctly  _ dangerous  _ skill sets.  He had seen people on jobs and around the estate that were paid to be in the background, at all times, with knives and ropes and vials of poison, even when Nico hated having just the one knife. 

It was a valid worry for Jason to have, to fear for their lives. 

“Something stupid, like going against a Lord who’s plotting something,” he said. Jason grimaced. “Or getting involved with said Lord and leaving you two out for the assassins.”

He could see Jason’s jaw tense, like he was grinding his teeth. When he looked up at her, Reyna was glaring at him. 

“Well, I’m not in on anything,” Nico said, when it became obvious neither of them would continue, “Sorry to disappoint.”

“Okay,” Jason said, finally, still sounding tense. 

Trust was a dangerous game. 

He could only take Nico at his word, but he didn’t have to like it. 

“I’m going,” Jason said, finally. “I’m meeting-” he stopped, looking back at Nico. 

He was going to meet Percy.

Nico said nothing. 

Jason just shook his head and turned, saying nothing more as he pushed away from the table he had leant against and moved towards the door. 

Nico stood to follow, and a hand shot out and grabbed his arm, tight. 

“I know what you’re doing, di Angelo,” Reyna said. Her voice was quiet, far too deliberately so. Nico shot his gaze forward, towards the door. Jason kept moving. 

“Enlighten me,” he replied. 

“You’ve been going to the castle, haven’t you? When you leave?” 

“I’m looking for the ring,” he said. 

“And you’ve never been seen? All of these times?”

“I don’t know why you’d think I would have been,” he said, fighting to keep his voice even. He was the best thief money could buy, but Reyna wasn’t blind, and hardly lacking skills. 

“Don’t play dumb with me,” she said. 

“You think I’m a traitor?”

“I don’t know what to think.”

“I’m not fucking you over, Reyna-”

“Being as reckless as you are, you may well be-”

“I can take care of myself.”

“Can you?” she pressed, pulling him around by her grip on his elbow until he was facing her properly. “I don’t know what’s happening, but it’s getting bigger than a heist or two, now.”

“I can take care of myself,” Nico said again, an edge in his voice. 

“You have absolutely no self-preservation,” she hissed, and her grip on his arm tightened. 

“Let me go, Reyna.”

She dropped his arms, pulling her arms back into herself reflexively.

“Don’t fuck us over, Nico.”

“I won’t,” he said, voice harsh, before turning away and heading for the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the love and comments and motivation and kind words! It's really made me actually want to finish this, when I'd lost motivation a few times because I was being very self critical. So, lots and lots of love to you all! <3
> 
> As all the comments have aptly noted, it’s quite clear that shit is about to hit the fan in this, so I was really eager to finish this chapter and share it. The next few chapters are likely going to be shorter than the others, and the chapter count is likely to change again (like it has already) because that’s just kind of how the chips fell. 
> 
> The next one is gonna be a real doozy so stay tuned 😂
> 
> Find me on tumblr @ americanbeautiies


	5. a lovesick fool

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have nothing to say for this

He was back in the castle. 

He wasn’t going to see Will. 

He refused. 

It had been a week since Nico had been given the seal, and a week since Nico had found Will’s necklace, in a box addressed to Hazel. 

He hadn’t seen her wear it, but it had disappeared from the office the next time he had returned.

On the other hand, Will’s ring hung heavy on a chain around his neck, a small thing lifted from Hazel when she was out. At night, he slept with it tucked in his hand, lest he lose the biggest haul he had ever won.

He didn’t know why he hadn’t given it up. 

Reyna was expecting the ring, and that meant there were other people with far more power expecting it. He could give it up, or pretend he was still parsing out a way to get it. 

It was stupid not to, probably the most stupid thing he’d ever done. He was double-crossing Reyna, Jason, the  _ Lord.  _ After stealing the most valuable haul of his life, he should be able to claim his reward.

But giving it up felt like a hollow victory, for some reason.

He was running out of time to make up his mind, and he knew it. 

His uncle had set, in no uncertain terms, a date by which he expected Nico to get him the ring, and it was far too close for comfort. 

Maybe the conversation with Jason and Reyna had shaken him. They had hardly been forthcoming with their information, but he didn’t doubt that the Lord was planning something. He figured it was perfectly reasonable to avoid handing over a seal of the royal family to someone with an agenda.

The fact it was the only thing he had of Will’s played nothing into it.

If he could get over his stupid sentimentality and treat it like any other job, his life would be far easier. Even if, without his realising it, it had stopped being like any other job, without him having ever noticed.

He let himself stop at a juncture in the cold corridors behind the castle walls, clearing his mind by force. 

He had obvious pretenses to keep up, so long as Reyna and Jason and  _ everyone  _ thought he still had to find the ring. He might as well find more use for it.

He could manage to stay away from the entire wing that housed the apartments of the royal family. 

He  _ would. _

There was a breeze filtering through the corridors, and he paused, letting the soft air brush against him. 

It was quiet, like it always was, and then, just faintly - 

Voices. 

He could hear the soft brush of people talking, words floating through the not so stagnant air towards him, distorted just slightly with distance. But while there had always been echoes from around the castle; through grates and doors and thinner sections of walls, these felt different. 

He grinned. 

They sounded like profit. 

He stepped silently down the corridor, following the voices until they were louder, clearer. And then, on the floor just to his left - 

A grate. 

It was a small thing, built for ventilation or for thieves. It looked down into an audience chamber full of deep mahogany furniture and gaudily dressed rich men. Nico rolled his eyes, but crouched down to listen.

“And for the marriage?” a man was saying, just out of sight.

“They’ve arranged a date for it.” 

“The bride?” 

There was a niggling sense of dread growing in his chest, as something started to crest over him, crawling over him like an accursed revelation. 

“Her father has agreed, the absolute fool.” 

“Signing off his only heir...”

Nico felt his heart thud. 

“Does he not have a nephew?” 

“Not by name,” the first voice said. “Rumour has it he’s kept locked in as a serving boy.” 

Familiarity was slow to build, and it was unwilling, but continued relentlessly anyway, as the men below him kept speaking. 

“Lord Levesque; the chief of fools.”

“His poor daughter won’t last a month after her wedding,” 

The room below descended into a chorus of haughty laughter.

Nico’s stomach lurched.

Hazel was engaged. 

There was a sharp spark of understanding blooming at the back of his brain as pieces he had been brushing past for weeks started to come together. Realisation was dawning on him far too quickly, clawing at each side of his brain even as he tried to stop the raging waves of what was blindingly obvious. 

He prayed he wasn’t right.

The census in the advisory offices. The rumours.

His heart thud heavy in his chest.

The letters. The necklace. 

“And the Prince?” 

“Agreed to be wed last week.”

Nico was going to be sick. 

☽☼☾

“How’s Frank?” Nico asked. The sky outside was a foggy purple as twilight fell. 

He had been watching Hazel where she stood in front of his mirror, from his spot atop her desk. He kicked his feet gently as she put the finishing touches on an elaborate outfit, ready for a ball.

“Fine, thank you,” she said. She cursed as her grip on her earrings slipped again, and a ruby fell to the ground. 

“Will he be accompanying you to this gala?” 

She turned to level a dull gaze at him from where she had crouched to search for her fallen earring, looking unamused, and he laughed. 

“He will not be,” she said. “I’m being accompanied by a gentleman from a family to the west of the Kingdom.” 

Nico slipped down onto the floor and moved over to her, crouching down to help her search.

“Here,” he said, picking up the small gem from under the mirror and passing it to his cousin.

“Thanks. Help me with my necklace?” she had said,

“Do you not have maids for this?” he asked, fidgeting with the clasp. As good as he was at picking pockets, he could see why she had been struggling. 

“They’re too nosy,” she said. “I love them, don’t get me wrong, but I - I can’t cope with that, tonight.”

“Am I not equally nosy?” 

“You usually have the good sense to be discreet about your pestering.”

He laughed, finally closing the clasp behind her neck and moving back so she could let her curly hair fall again. Nico watched her dust off the front of her dress from where she had knelt on the ground. 

“I also hold out in the hope you come back to me first with gossip,” he said.

“The Princess did cause a stir the other day, dying her hair with green ink,” she said. 

“Well,” Nico said, offering his arm out to her. She took it, looping her arm in his. “Here’s to hoping this time the scandal isn’t about you and your guard.”

Hazel had laughed, and Nico had smiled, feeling light and completely unaware.

☽☼☾

“You can’t have always wanted to be a thief, surely,” Will had said. 

He had reclined on the plush sofa of his parlour, head tipped against the armrest as he watched Nico across the room. 

Night had fallen. In a few days, there would be a gala with nobility across the city. Will would be there, and Hazel would be there, and for once, Nico let himself wish that he could tag along.

He had curled up on the windowsill, that night, but not for the reasons he usually would have chosen to. When he first started to visit, his perch next to the windows had been tactical. He had been as close to the exit as possible, and had preferred it that way. 

But tonight, that wasn't it. It hadn't even crossed his mind, this time - he had just wanted to see the sky. 

“You don’t know that,” he said, and turned back to meet Will’s eyes. He raised an eyebrow. 

“Did you, then?” 

“I suppose not,” he said, after a pause. “I wanted to study history, as a kid.” 

He could see Will smiling, and felt himself smile too. It was contagious, with Will.

“But here you are?”

“I didn’t have a choice,” he admitted. He watched the fond smile wilt off of Will’s face. 

Will looked away. 

“It’s not that bad,” Nico said, but Will had simply shaken his head.

“That isn’t it. I just know what it’s like, to not have a choice.”

Nico pondered it. Will was - 

Will was a Prince, and the Crown Prince, at that. He had anything he wanted at the tip of his fingertips. The privilege he had compared to anyone else Nico knew was insurmountable. 

But he supposed, he still hadn’t chosen it.

“I’m not complaining, by any means,” Will said again. “It’s just daunting to have responsibility hoisted upon you suddenly at such a young age.”

Nico nodded. The room fell quiet, and Nico watched him, staying silent until he filled the space.

“Did you know I used to have two older brothers?” he said, catching Nico’s eye. He blinked. 

He had not. 

If he thought back to his own childhood he could perhaps remember hearing something of the sort shared by members of his family, but it would have been back in the days before he had started needing to care who said what, and why. 

Will smiled sadly as he shook his head, and nodded. 

“They both died when I was young,” he said. “But either way it suddenly fell to me to be the heir. And here we are.”

“I’m sorry,” Nico said, after a pause. 

He hated that he hadn’t even known. 

“It’s been a while,” Will said. “I just. It had a lasting impact. Obviously. I have to do what’s right for the kingdom, now, not just the things I want to do.”

“Like make a deal with a thief?”

Will laughed, and Nico felt a weight on his chest he hadn’t noticed ease. 

“Well, at least I'm using it to my benefit,” he said, and Nico smiled. 

The people were lucky to have him as their Prince.

  
  
  
  
  


☽☼☾

Nico struggled to keep the walls around him from spinning as he pushed himself to stand, in the dingy corridor that laced the inside of the castle.

Hazel and Will were engaged. 

The realisation was making his head swim.  His chest ached, with fury or heartbreak, he couldn’t tell. 

He stumbled back away from the grate, as rage started to bite at his heels. 

The advisors had said he had agreed to be wed just last week.  Nico had seen him just last week. 

He thought back to the necklace; it’s glimmering gold and priceless ruby. In Will’s parlour, and then in a box, given to Hazel. A gift. An  _ expensive  _ gift. 

An engagement gift.

Will had known, when he gave Nico his ring, and said nothing.  He had known, Nico realised, from the night he had asked him to take him out of the castle. 

Will knew that there was every chance they would have gotten caught on that night, when he had had him take him outside. Nico had been a fool to ever entertain the idea, just barely scraping by an obvious set up.  Will had known he would be married, soon, knew he would be losing something, soon, knew that, soon - 

Nico stopped himself from kicking a wall. 

How could he have been so  _ stupid?  _

Hazel was the heir to the second largest estate in the kingdom, second only to the Crown. Her father had immense sway over the land, and that made her a loose end, no matter how kind she was. 

She wasn’t a pawn, and yet these men sat within the safety of the Crown, treating her like nothing more than a chess piece. 

And he was no better. 

If this was their plan all along, to get to Hazel, keeping tabs on her foolish little thief of a cousin was the best option. 

_ Locked away as a serving boy,  _ his mind supplied. Had he ever been just that? He was an  _ asset,  _ and that made him just as much of a thread to snip.

Reyna had every right to be concerned. He  _ was  _ being reckless, and he had been reckless all along. How many nights had he spent with Will? What had he said? Was it ever actually insignificant? What had he risked?

His stomach turned, thinking about Will. Thinking about dancing with him. About his hands, his chest underneath him, his presence floating in the lake outside the castle walls. 

All of it, fake. 

He cursed himself for forgetting that he wasn’t toying with a brainless mark. Will was smart, and he may well be ruthless.

Nico had been a fool. 

He gave into the urge to kick the wall, stubborn and angry, unable to keep a soft curse from falling out of his mouth as anger bubbled up inside him. 

Will knew. Will had _agreed._

He pushed back from the vent, storming back into the first of the tunnels he had found in the castle. 

Will had known the whole time, and played him like the lovesick fool he was. 

He pushed hard against the hidden doorway that led into Will’s parlour, harder than necessary, and stepped into the room without second thought to who might be there.  Will’s head shot up, startled, curls flopping into his face. Shock and surprise flit across his face and Nico  _ hated  _ how quickly the thought of how horribly beautiful he looked rose unbidden into his mind. 

“You know you only had to say if you wanted to see me again,” Will said, slipping into a grin. His voice was casual and airy, smiling wider as Nico stepped further into the room.

As he stood and stepped towards Nico, the rage in his stomach flared. 

“I’m not a fool,” he said, quietly. 

Will stopped. 

He was across the room from Nico, with furniture between them, and Nico thought he should count himself lucky there wasn’t a direct path towards him. He could feel the weight of the ring around his neck, the constant presence of the knife strapped to his thigh.

“You  _ knew _ ,” Nico continued, gut souring. 

He wanted to storm up to Will and throw him across the room for treating him like a fool, for playing him like a fiddle, for leaning close and smiling softly and making him  _ care,  _ all to get to Hazel.

“Excuse me?” Will said, finally. His eyes narrowed.

“About Hazel. Your  _ fiancé. _ ”

Will sucked in a sharp breath, the gasp an admission in itself. 

Of course. 

Nico let out a harsh laugh, and felt his chest ache. No matter how much he wanted to deny it, there was no way that he hadn’t been in on it. He had never been stupid, but Nico had been, caught up in the glamour and charm of a Prince trained to be cunning, to be deadly. 

“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean,” was all he said, and Nico wanted to scream, until the diplomatic facade that fell over his face shattered. 

“As if,” Nico spit. “You know what they’ll do to her.”

“I don’t know anything more than the fact I am to be engaged,” Will said, sharp, firm, stepping around the chair between them. “I think you can guess why I didn’t tell you.”

“Of course not, your  _ Highness,”  _ Nico said, voice dripping with acid and derision. “Why on earth would you tell a lowly half wit of a thief like me?” 

“You  _ are  _ a fool,” Will spit, voice suddenly laced with rage as he stepped towards Nico, with fire in his eyes and Nico - 

Reyna was wrong. 

He was built of nothing but self-preservation. 

The room was dead silent after the crash of Will’s beloved tea set toppling to the ground behind Nico stopped.

He had flinched. 

He was the best thief in the city, in the nation, trained up in subtlety and a master of the shadows, a man that had seen his fair share of fights and blood. 

And he had flinched. 

Will stood stock still, horror in his eyes. It cascaded down his face, mouth open, and silent. 

Nico had flinched, falling back into the table and pushing the tray to the with a crash, but he refused to avert his gaze now. 

Let the Prince look down with regret. 

His hand was halfway raised, and no matter how much he wished he wouldn't have, Nico had no doubt he had been ready to hit him.  If Will was raised to be cunning, Nico was raised to be constantly cautious, and some things were just too hard to break.

“Nico,” Will said.  He sounded horrified. He had loved to hear his name on Will’s lips but here, now, whispered with pain and fear - at Nico? at himself? - it was all wrong. 

Nico stayed silent.

“I wasn’t-” 

A bang at the door made Will jump, whirling towards the door, and Nico moved.

“Is everything okay, Your Highness?” a guard said through the door.

“Just fine,” Will said with a light laugh, and Nico’s gut rolled at the cheer in his voice. “Although I did see a spider.”

“I can send for a cleaner, Your Highness?” 

“Don’t disturb them tonight. But tomorrow, perhaps.”

“Of course, Your Highness.”

Will turned back to an empty room and an open window, and sighed.

Nico watched from his place hidden between the bookshelf and the outer wall, hidden in stark shadow, as Will moved to the window and peered out. 

He turned his head each way, looking down along the ledges spanning the length of the wall, and out across the courtyard. 

“I wasn’t going to hit you,” Will said, and Nico would have sucked in a sharp breath if he had been any less well trained. He had made more than enough mistakes for a lifetime, just in this one room. 

He stayed silent. 

Will had to think him long gone by now. Nico was nothing but a mark, to have an eye on, but not to fret about. He had already proved that he was useless, anyway.  The Prince was a pretty face that might be ruthless, but he was out of his depth when it came time to hide. 

He wouldn’t look in the corner. 

Nico shut his eyes. He had to believe that Will wouldn’t look. Forget the fact he had seen him all those times before, always knew that there was someone there. 

He couldn’t look. 

Will turned his back to where Nico was hidden in the shadows and ducked into his bedroom, closing the door with a final click. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ARRANGED MARRIAGE SUBPLOT LET’S GOOOO
> 
> Honestly it’s all down hill from here, good fucking luck 😂 This is what I’ve spent four chapters building up to and is one hell of a catalyst for more general angst and drama and plot and I was terrified to post this but I hope you all enjoyed it!!!!
> 
> Yell at me on tumblr @ americanbeautiies


	6. a job for a thief

He went straight to the library when he returned: there was no light on in Hazel’s window, and there was nowhere else she would be. 

It was quiet when he stepped through the door, and he muffled each step by walking as close to the shelves as he could. They had been curated by generations of the Levesque family, and Nico knew it well, even if he tended to use it for hiding, more than reading. 

Hazel was likely the only one to get any real use out of it, but Nico could see its benefits. 

It was quiet, at this time of night, with sound absorbed by the plush carpets and heavy books, but it wasn’t silent. 

Nico stopped, crouching down at the end of a row. He crossed his arms over his knees as he lowered himself down to the ground just below a wide window, and listened. 

“I’m sorry,” someone said. He heard them sniffle, and the rustling of cloth, like they had been crying. 

“It’s okay. We- it’s okay.” 

Nico let his head drop forward onto his forearms. He hadn’t talked to Frank much, but he sounded kind. 

“It’s not  _ fair _ -” Hazel said, sounding like she had started to tear up again. 

“I know,” Frank replied, voice soft. “You’ll be okay. We’ll both be-”

He cut himself off, and the library fell back to relative silence once more. Nico waited.

“You need to go,” Hazel said. Her voice was muffled. “You’ll be late.”

“You shouldn’t be alone-”

“I need time to myself.”

“Okay,” Frank said, quietly, after a pause, before cutting himself off with a deep breath. “I love you, Hazel.”

“Love you too,” she said.

Nico closed his eyes, feeling distinctly like he shouldn’t be listening. 

His heart hurt. 

He heard footsteps and glanced up. At the end of the row he saw a figure move past, but Frank didn’t look up, and didn’t see Nico. 

No one had ever looked twice.

Nico pushed himself to stand, feeling slow, but forced himself to move to the end of the row and step around the shelves. He leaned against the heavy wooden bookcase, peering down the row at his cousin. 

“How long have you known?” 

Hazel jumped, turning around to land her eyes on Nico. Around her neck, a gold necklace, with a bright cut ruby sitting gently at the centre.

He could see her eyes glimmering with unshed tears, and watched her bite the inside of her cheek. It was an anxious habit she had had since childhood. 

“About?” she asked, in a voice that came with being too practiced at hiding her emotions. 

“About the Prince.”

Hazel sighed. Nico watched her fiddle with a ring on her thumb. She didn’t touch the necklace, and she didn’t look at him. 

“A few days,” she said. “Maybe a week.”

“And you’ll accept?” Nico pressed, stepping out of the shadows to move towards her. 

“Do I have a choice?” she asked, a sad smile on her face. 

Nico bit his lip. He knew she didn’t. Lords and Ladies and even minor royals never did, far less so when they were women. 

“Not that I can see,” he admitted, and she nodded. 

“So I will say yes.”

“But if they try and-” he cut himself off, biting his lip against the words that he knew would never sound good, too far from kind, not even coming from her own cousin. 

“Kill me?” she asked. He nodded, reluctant. 

She hadn’t wanted kindness. She had wanted honesty. 

“They could,” Nico said.

“They could tonight if they wanted to,” she replied.

“But marriage would make it easier.”

“It’s always easy, Nico,” she said with a laugh, shaking her head. “We’re all just marks for someone else with more power.”

He paused, but found himself nodding, unable to disagree. 

He had always assumed he was the one with the power; the thief, the spy. Except now he knew he was wrong. Will was a Prince, with resources and time and more help than Nico could ever possibly dream of. 

He had been holding the power the whole time.

“And the Crown always has power,” he said. He was almost surprised at the bitterness in his voice.

“The Prince is kind,” she said, but her voice sounded vague, almost far away. “We’ve spoken.”

Nico laughed, unable to help himself. 

He knew he was kind. He knew with every fibre of his being how much Will cared about his people, his citizens - or at least, he had thought he had. 

“He is,” Hazel said, again. 

“I know,” Nico replied. She blinked, looking at him with a gaze that reminded him suddenly and distinctly of the most cunning of the people he worked with. 

She wasn’t stupid. 

“Nico,” she said, looking at him with worry deep set into her eyes. “What have you done?”

He felt his hands itch to reach for the chain around his neck, where the Prince’s ring hung heavy. He bit at the inside of his cheek instead, brushing his fingers against the knife on his thigh. 

“ _ Nico _ ,” she said again.

He couldn’t keep anything from her. 

“I’ve been speaking to him,” he said, voice quiet.

“When you say speaking to -”

“I made a deal for his ring.” 

“What?”

“His ring.”

“His seal?”

He nodded. Hazel groaned. 

“Nico,“ she said, voice laced heavily with horror. “What did you do?”

“Nothing  _ stupid, _ ” he said, although he didn’t believe that, anymore.

“If my father finds out-”

“He won’t,” he said, stepping closer to her, close to begging her to believe him. As if he could convince himself. 

“Nico-”

A door opened, further down the room.

“I have it, now,” he said, voice quiet, and rushed. “But I can’t- You have to take this,” he said instead, reaching around his neck and unclasping the chain. He pressed the small, golden ring into her palm, closing her fingers over it. 

“Are you  _ insane _ ?”

“Please-“

“Nico, what have you  _ done _ ?” she said, voice laced with dread, but he shook his head, and slipped back into the shadows.

☽☼☾

The estate had plenty of dark corners, and Nico made use of that fact as often as he could.

His heart thud in his chest as he tucked himself into a dark corner of the estate, not quite trusting himself to go back to his room. His fingers itched for the weight of the ring. He had been unaware how much he had treasured it before now. But it was gone. 

He spent the rest of the night and most of the day sleeping fretfully in any corner of the house that was unoccupied. Reyna would tell him he was sulking, and he wouldn’t deny it. 

So what if he was sulking. 

He knew he held grudges, worse than anyone else he knew. But he felt like, at this moment in time, he was perfectly justified in doing so. 

One of his best friends was endangered by the crown, another two hardly trusted him, and a third - 

He paused, startled at the realisation he considered Will a friend. 

He fiddled with the strap of his knife absently, and he thought back to the night of the ball.

There had only been a few short weeks since that night. It felt like any time at all had passed between where Nico was now, sitting with the full knowledge of Will’s engagement, and the night Hazel had gone out to the ball. He had never thought he had been stupid, before, but knowing how much he was unaware of was sobering.

He hadn’t even begun to think that they would have been spending that evening together.

He hadn’t thought anything of it, when she had gone. He had helped her with her jewellery and stayed at home, and hardly mentioned it to Will the next time he saw him. 

He cursed. That was weeks ago, and he had to take stock of where he was  _ now _ .

He had the seal - or at least, Hazel did - and wasn’t keen to give it up. Will had given up the seal, even knowing that he was about to be married. 

_ Married to Hazel,  _ he thought, bitter. 

Will knew he was marrying Nico’s cousin and strung him along, even knowing that their marriage would likely end in her death. 

“But why give it up?” Nico muttered, fidgeting with a loose stone in the crevice he had tucked himself into, and wishing he had Will’s ring. 

Something wasn’t making sense. 

If Will had been using him for information intent on manipulating Hazel, he had no reason to actually follow through and give Nico the seal. He could have had him killed. He could still have him killed, of course, but he was hiding. It would be fine. 

If he hadn’t initially planned to use him to get to Hazel, he had information, now. What had Nico told him, over the hours and hours spent in his company? 

All that came to mind was the cost of bread, and Will’s hands, on his.

He groaned, tipping his head back against the wall.

_ The fucking Prince,  _ he thought, as angry at himself as he was at Will. Why had he ever thought he could outplay him?

He had never been telling Nico the whole story, always asking more than he had answered, and Nico had played into it like a fool. A lovesick  _ fool.  _

But none of it made sense, and that was the worst part. He still didn’t know why he had been sent for the seal in the first place, or why Reyna and Jason were so impatient for him to finish. And on top of it all, there was the enigma of Will. For all of the cunning that had to have gone into any of the past months, it was still as if Will was acting with no plan whatsoever.

He pushed himself out of the tiny hole in the wall he had crouched in, suddenly eager to move. He paused to allow a small serving boy to rush past before ducking through the darkened corridors.

It seemed like the Levesque home took notes from the construction of the castle. There were nowhere near as many passages and tunnels, but every so often there was a hallway that was distinctly, almost purposefully, left unused and unfinished. It was almost like it had been built the same way, on purpose. Nico wasn’t even sure he knew - 

“And about the wedding-”

He stopped. 

“What about it?” a voice said, and Nico stepped back. He retracted his steps, silently, until he found the source of it. 

There was a sliver of space between two thick walls that Nico hadn’t paid much mind to before. Leaning into it, though, he realised he could hear voices through a small grate in the floor. Ducking down, he shifted forward until, to his surprise, he realised he could see.

He was looking down into an office. His eyebrows raised, realising exactly whose office it was. 

“The sooner the better,” the Lord said, sounding distinctly unhappy about it. 

Nico could just about see him through the thin slats in the vent, and he looked tired. Angry, almost. 

“We don’t have any back up-”

“I don’t care about back up,” he spat. “I care about getting this  _ done.” _

“We need the ring to ensure that everything is passed on before-”

“A lawful marriage will have to do.”

“But -”

“Once my daughter is legally married to the Crown Prince, he can be killed. Not before.”

The floor shifted beneath Nico’s feet, and, just like that, it fit together. 

They needed the seal, currently in Hazel’s hands, to sign away anything that Will - and the crown - had. If they were engaged, which they were, and had a letter to Hazel, signed in Will’s hand, it would go to Hazel without question. To the Levesque family. 

They didn’t have the seal, though, so there was no choice but to go ahead with the wedding. Forget the fact it put Hazel in insurmountable danger - it gave the Lord unfettered access to the Royal Treasury through his daughter. 

After that, Will was expendable, or worse: an obstacle.

It was never simply a job for a thief. Will would have ended up dead no matter what.

Either option put him in danger, but the stark difference was that this plan, this stupid, stupid plan, was signing a death sentence for Hazel, too.

They didn’t have the seal, because of Nico. He had failed them, and damned Hazel at the same time. He had left her defenseless, and Nico powerless to help her. 

The wedding would go ahead, and no one would listen to a nameless nobody like him.

With the things he’d done and the people he’d fooled, he should be able to hold the power to protect his best friend, but he was nothing, and nobody. He was the best damn thief the Kingdom had seen, and yet - 

He stopped.

He was the best damn thief that money could buy. He knew it, and he wasn’t the only person who knew it. 

He felt his balance rock, unsteady even where he crouched on the ground.He had been deluded in his desire to believe otherwise, but the Lord knew it. Nico sucked in a sharp breath. 

His uncle had never for a damn minute thought Nico didn’t have the seal.

He cursed. He was always in danger of some sort - it was an occupational hazard - but he knew as well as anyone what the Lord would do knowing he had willfully withheld something from him. 

That Nico was the reason he had to go jumping through hurdles and risking something as dangerous as  _ legality -  _

They couldn’t fake the marriage. The Lord had no choice but to ensure the two wed legally. That was not what he had wanted. It was a stupid thing for someone planning to rob the Royal Treasury to want. 

Nico was the reason they had to go the long way around, and it put a target on his head. 

He had damned Hazel, and he couldn’t help Will.

There was no way he could go back to Hazel now, not unless he wanted to alert the entire household to the fact that she had it. Forget the fact she hadn’t been in on anything - she would not be spared for holding onto it. 

He had one option.

He had to tell Will. 

He could feel an unpleasant twist in his gut at the idea of it, but he had no choice. 

He thought back to the falling tea set, and shook his head. It didn’t matter how he had last seen Will, this was more important. 

He pushed himself to stand, ready to duck out into the dark of night to go straight to the castle. Glancing once more at the vent, Nico - 

His heart stopped. 

Looking at him through the gaps in the vent, as clear as day - 

His Uncle. 

“Excuse me,” the Lord said, moving to stand and striding towards the door.

“ _ Fuck _ ,” Nico said.

He pushed himself up to dash down the corridor, sprinting as fast as he could towards his tiny room. He slipped around corridors, apologising quickly to the serving girl he sent stumbling and cursing the idea of subtlety, now. 

His mind raced, body shaking with adrenaline. 

_ What did he need? Where would his uncle be? Did he have time? _

He flung the door to his room open, the need for secrecy gone with the knowledge that he had mere moments before his Uncle came for him. 

He scrambled through the ragged sheets on his bed. His knife was on his leg, but he hadn’t been prepared to run. He needed his lockpicks, any money he knew he had - 

The door slammed shut behind him, and Nico was thrown to the ground. 

And then two pairs of hands were on his arms, pulling him up none too gently by his shoulders, sending twin arcs of pain racing down his arms. He was turned to the door, struggles falling on deaf ears.

“You’re a good for nothing brat,” the Lord hissed. Nico ground his teeth, fighting the bubbling rage in his stomach that made him want to spit and yell and kick at anything within his reach.

“You should have expected me to be listening,” he said.

“Can’t have you ferrying it back like a lapdog, though, can I?” 

“I’m telling your  _ own daughter, _ ” he said. “She should already know her father is a-”

“I don’t mean my daughter, you idiot,” he said. Nico could see anger biting at his heels. “I mean that brat of a Prince.”

Nico sucked in a breath, unable to even deny it. 

Reyna knew he had been in the castle. Even if her loyalties had faltered, if she knew something, so did the Lord of the house. 

He hadn’t told Will about his family, but he couldn’t deny he had been in the castle. 

He ground his teeth and said nothing. 

He had been blind to anything other than protecting Hazel. He hadn’t even noticed that he was developing the same sort of devotion to Will. 

He had left himself vulnerable. 

“We need to keep you in check, boy,” the Lord continued. Nico took in deep breaths through his nose, fighting the ever burning spikes of anger that spun through him. “Just like your mother.”

It was a losing battle.

“Bold of you to assume you could ever make a cage that’d hold me,” he snapped. 

“Watch me try,” he hissed, rearing his hand back and hitting Nico hard in the jaw. He fell towards the ground, but the hulking arms holding him hoisted him back upright before he could stand himself, twisting his shoulders painfully. He struggled against the figures holding him aloft, and they tightened their grip. 

If he kept struggling, they could dislocate his shoulders. There was very little worse than that, for a thief.

“I can’t put my best investment out of work, can I?” the Lord whispered, voice salty and dark. “But don’t think I won’t if you keep this up. Where’s the ring?” 

“I don’t have it.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“Tough shit.”

His uncle hit him again, and Nico swore, seeing stars sparking behind his eyelids. 

“Going to have to try harder than that for an answer,” he said with a laugh, stretching his jaw. 

His Uncle dropped his hands, shaking out a fist once, twice, before turning away and moving back towards the door. 

“Get an answer out of him.” 

Nico bit down a spike of panic that bubbled up within him. 

He had dealt with worse. It’d be fine. 

“He doesn’t leave the room until he talks.” 

It would be  _ fucking  _ fine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love reading all of your comments ahhhh 🥺 Thank you all so much for sticking with this! I'm trying to balance my updates so they're not too rapid, but I'm also finishing them up pretty fast so maybe more will come soon! 
> 
> Yell at me on tumblr @ americanbeautiies

**Author's Note:**

> Please feel free to yell at me in the comments or on tumblr @ americanbeautiies


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